A^^ 
^ ^ 




O H 





H 



























'.♦ / ^^^ '-^P,- ^* ^^ 



0« v- 














CLdju.lt 



Plate I. — Proportions of the diverse segments of the body compared 
to height (= 100) at the ages of evolution. 



GROWTH DURING 
SCHOOL AGE 

ITS APPLICATION TO EDUCATION 

BY 
PAUL GODIN, M. D. 

Laureate of the Institute of the Academy of Medicine 

and of the Anthropological Society of Paris, Professor 

in the School of the Science of Education {Rousseau 

Institute) of Geneva 

TRANSLATED BY 

SAMUEL L. EBY 

Sometime Instructor of Psychology, A. E. F. University, 

Beaune (Cote d'Or), France 

Superintendent-elect, Niles (Ohio) City Schools 




BOSTON 
RICHARD G. BADGER 

THE GORHAM PRESS 



^/ 



7-^-.? 



Copyright, 1920, by Richard G. Badger 



All Rights Reserved 






oi 



^n-i 



Made in the United States of America 



The Gorham Press, Boston, U. S. A. 



SEP 1 1 1920 
©CU576346 



" . . . Ce qui faU Vinteret, pour Vinsiituteur, des phe- 
nomhnes de croissance physique, c'est qu'ils ont une repercussion 
sur les fonctions psychiques et sur I'energie du travail 
mental. ..." 

ED. CLAPAREDE, 

{Psychologie de V enfant, 4me edit., p. 155) 



TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE 

THIS translation of Doctor Godin's La croissance pen- 
dant Vdge scolaire is presented to American students of 
education for the purpose, first, of introducing the writings 
of a Frenchman who has long been a student of scientific edu- 
cation. Nearly forty years ago the author began the study 
of education. He has written much and many of his works 
have won recognition from the highest scientific societies in 
France. The author merits a wider circle of acquaintances 
in the United States of America than he has apparently 
enjoyed up to the present time. A second purpose is to 
direct greater attention to the contributions to the theory 
and practice of education in France. The translator in- 
clines to the thought that American educators have tended 
too much to neglect French educational practice in the 
study of education. A more careful study of the work of 
the French along the line of scientific education will prove 
fruitful to American teachers and educators. 

In itself this work of Doctor Godin should prove very 
valuable, first, for its scientific method. Within the last 
decade or two more emphasis has been placed on collect- 
ing statistics on physical growth and development of adoles- 
cents. Much of this work has yielded no valuable scientific 
results. Many figures and much data have been gathered 
but the method of collecting them has been such that the 
conclusions based upon them are frequently unreliable or 
unwarranted. This is especially true in respect of measure- 
ments of physical growth of adolescents. Measuring a large 

5 



6 Translator's Preface 

group of twelve-year-olds or fourteen-year-olds and then 
determining medians or averages of weights and heights 
bears no fruitful results, if, as has very frequently been the 
case, the measurement is made once for all. It may mean 
something or it may mean nothing to compare the meas- 
urements of a particular individual with the medians of a 
large group. Whatever it may mean, it gives no signifi- 
cant assistance in the method of educational direction ; it 
gives no insight into the disposition and nature of the par- 
ticular individual whom the teacher is trying to educate. 
The only physical measurements worth while are those which 
admit of comparisons with previous states of development 
of the same individual. Such comparisons can be valid 
only when repeated measurements are taken at regular in- 
tervals. These repeated measurements are necessary in or- 
der to enable the teacher and educator to know the child in- 
timately and profoundly; it makes possible a degree of in- 
dividualization of education unknown in the past. In its 
final analysis successful direction of education depends 
largely upon its individualization. It is along this line that 
every child — the supernormal, the normal, and the subnor- 
mal — will be enabled to realize his whole self. The work 
here presented is an example of the method of the individu- 
alization of educational practice. 

The value of educational measurements is summed up in 
a recent publication.^ Doctor Godin's work is a model of 
scientific procedure in educational measurements and avoids 
precisely the errors pointed out by that writer. It points 
the way which educators must follow if these failures and 
errors are to be avoided and corrected. 

In the second place, the work is a valuable contribution 
to our knowledge of adolescence. Of the many books on 

^Strayer and Norsworthy: "How to Teach," p. 155f. 



Translators Preface 7 

adolescence, this is one of the highest scientific value. The 
laws of growth have been determined experimentally in a 
truly scientific manner. Adolescence has been very care- 
fully and accurately defined. Every teacher who knows 
these laws of growth and comprehends the meaning of 
adolescence and its bearing on education of the individual 
as set forth in Doctor Godin's careful study will be equipped 
to deal more effectively with the individual under his charge. 

The second part of the work is a discussion of the prac- 
tical application to schoolroom practice of laws and princi- 
ples of the first part. It gives us the viewpoint of ad- 
vanced educational practice in France. In the last chap- 
ter is found what the author regards as one of the most 
important features of the book, namely, the "individual for- 
mula." This is the first form of expression of the formula. 
The author himself has pointed out that the formula as it 
stands here is open to the criticism that the value of the 
result of the formula bears an inverse relation to the age of 
the individual. He suggests inverting the fraction, thus 
making the magnitude of the results bear a direct relation 
to increase of age of the individual. The author had 
planned to restate the formula to obviate this criticism. 
The Great War unfortunately compelled him to defer this 
correction indefinitely. It is to be hoped that he will be 
able to perfect the "individual formula" and present it in a 
definitive form. 

The translator acknowledges his indebtedness to numerous 
persons for valuable help and criticisms. Much of the merit 
of the translation is due to the assistance of these persons. 
They are not responsible for any of the faults or defects 
found therein. Acknowledgment is especially due to Mrs. 
Emma Rower Cory, A.M., formerly instructor in English, 
Ohio State University, sometime instructor in French, War- 



8 Translator's Preface 

ren (Ohio) High School; to Superintendent Alfred H. 
Meese, A.B., B.Sc. in Ed., Shaker Heights, Ohio. The 
glossary was prepared by Miss Ida L Eby, B.S., M.D. 

S. L. Eby 
Kent, Ohio, 

September 1, 1919. 



FOREWORD 

1TAKE genuine pleasure, students, teachers and educa- 
tors, in dedicating to you this work which springs en- 
tirely from continuous observation of the child and which 
brings together the lessons that you have followed. 

The lively attention which you have accorded me, dis- 
suades me from every formality except that which has held 
your kindly interest. 

You desire the child to be your unique teacher according 
to the luminous motto of the School of the Science of Edu- 
cation, Discat a puero magisterl and you have felt that I 
was simply trying to be the interpreter of the child. For it 
is, indeed, the child who by his individual growth affords us 
a deep insight into the secrets of his life, and teaches us a 
marvelous lesson of things, in inviting us to discover the 
unity which presides over his manifold transformations and 
which is his very person. 

If you know a good deal of his physical individuality, you 
also know a good deal of his cerebral function which is 
caused in a large measure by the condition of the brain and 
by its relations with the rest of the body. 

You rendered homage to the enlightening power of the 
study of growth, when in course of a lesson which caused 
you to penetrate to the heart of the child, you said to me in 
a transport which I can never forget : "How intimately you 
know him, indeed !" 

When in turning the leaves of this book your eyes fall on 

9 



1^ Foreword 

the expressions: ''We see, we infer . . . ," imagine Ihat we 
are still working together at the Rousseau Institute. You 
are present at every page. 

Paul Godin 
June 1, 1913. 



II 



CONTENTS 

PART I 
ANALYSIS OF GROWTH 



PAGE 



CHAPTER 

I. Reasons Why Growth Has a Place Among the 
Subjects Taught in a School of the Science 
OF Education 21 

School age is above all an age of growth.— Growth has 
a double influence on the cerebral function. — New instruc- 
tion; upon what it is based.— Outline of the data which the 
study of growth can furnish.— Its termination is the deter- 
mination of the somatic individuality of the child. 

II. Method of Study of Growth or the Auxano- 

LOGicAL Method 31 

Methods not to follow.— Worthlessness of isolated mea- 
surements.— Measurement of stature becomes useful as soon 
as It is introduced.— Rhythm of lengthening of the body.— 
What is adolescence?— The great post-foetal lengthening of 
the body by the lower limbs takes place between birth and 
the age of seven years, and not at the time of puberty. — 
The method to follow is that which the nature of the phe- 
nomena and the utilitarian objective of the results of obser- 
vation dictate. 

III. Metrical Proportions of the Body of the 

Child from Birth to Adult Age .... 39 

The proportions of the human body and the artists of 
Egypt, of Greece, of Rome, of the Middle Ages; contem- 
porary artists.— Anthropometric canon of the child at dif- 
ferent ages.— Influence of growth on the variations of the 
proportions of the body.— Partial proportions.— Impor- 
tance of functional correlations. 

IV. Influences Which Act UPON Growth ... 53 

Influences which act upon stature.— Influence of food, of 
sex, of race, of heredity, of season, of gestation, of exercise.— 
Reciprocal relation of illness and growth.— Influence of 
function of reproduction. 

11 



12 Contents 

CHAPTER PAGE 

V. Puberty — Influence of the Reproductive 

Element on Growth 66 

Determination of the dawn of puberty. — Some causes of 
error. — Most favorable season for the dawn of puberty. — 
Almost the whole of puberal phenomena escapes him who 
does not repeat semiannually his observations on the same 
subject. — What is puberty? Definition. 

VI. Puberty (Continued) 76 

Analysis of puberty by means of the phenomena of growth .^ 
which it determines. — Augmented growth, reduced or"" 
arrested growth, total growth or appearance of organs, dis- 
appearance of organs, involutions. — Embryogenic function 
of puberty. 

VII. Puberty (Continued) 85 

Influence of alimentation by the placenta. — Precocious 
puberty; delayed puberty. — Some somatic conditions of 
psychological puberty — an example. — Separation of pu- 
bescents from non-pubescents. 

VIII. Puberty (Continued) - 94 

Duration of period of puberty; signs of d^but, signs of 
termination. — Internubilo-pubescent period or youth. — 
Distance from puberty to nubility or adult state. — Some 
educational considerations touching these periods. — Syn- 
thesis of the relations of the reproductive element and 
growth: phases of life in function of reproduction. — In- 
fluence on growth of the traumatic suppression of the ger- 
men. 

IX. Some Laws of Growth 104 

Laws and method. — Make-up of the laws of growth. — 
Law of alternation. — Laws of puberty. — Laws of propor- 
tion. — Principle of irregular puberal growth. — R6sum6 and 
formulas of the laws of growth. 

PART II 
APPLICATIONS TO EDUCATION AND PEDAGOGY 

I. Unequal Growth in the Scholar. Organic 
Troubles Which Provoke It and of Which 
THE Teacher and Educator Have to Take 
Account 123 

Of what unequal growth consists. — Interest of education 
in the troubles which it determines. — Examples of puberal 
troubles due to unequal growth. — Pedagogical consequences 
of these troubles. 



Contents 13 

CHAPTER PAGE 

II. Growth by Great Alternations. What the 

Educator and Teacher Can Infer From It . 138 

Alternate rhythm of growth for the spinal column and for 
the cranium. — Alternations in the development of the ger- 
men. — Relative independence of the evolution of growth to 
great alternations. — Relation between them and with 
puberty. — Pedagogical and educational deductions. 

III. Various Pedagogical Applications .... 142 

Pubescents and non-pubescents. — Their somatic and psy- 
chical differences. Pedagogical deductions. — "Educative 
moment" of each organ. — Deference of the law of alterna- 
tion. — Growth and intelligence. — Position of scholar in 
school-room — necessity of varying it. 

IV. Individualization of School Furniture . . 152 

It is seated and not standing that the scholar makes use of 
it. — Error resulting from the measure of the scholar's height 
standing taken as guide in assigning of seat. — Height stand- 
ing and height sitting. — Anatomical and physiological con- 
ditions which must govern the choice of individual furni- 
ture. — Simple means of conforming to it. — Working Manual. 

V. Control of Physical Education by the 

AUXANOLOGICAL MeTHOD 161 

Account to be taken of growth. — Checking of the effects 
of exercise with the fixed bar on the development of stature, 
of the chest, of the pelvis, of the limbs. — Gymnasts and 
non-gymnasts. — Various causes of abstention. — Conclu- 
sions relative to the results of exercise aimed at and to the 
method of checking. 

VI. Asymmetry and Education 180 

Half of the body. — Variation of the length of the sternum 
and rickets. — The shoulders of the child. — Asymmetry of 
the human body; those things which it is necessary to know 
by reason of their educative interest. — Probable part taken 
by the brain in functional asymmetries. — Bimanual educa- 
tion (ambidexterity). 

VII. AUXANOLOGICAL INVESTIGATION OF THE ScHOLAR . 191 

Anatomical conditions of function. — ^Form and skele- 
ton. — Their modification by growth. — Anthropometric 
guiding-marks. 

VIII. Measurement of the Scholar in Accordance 

WITH THE "Individual Record of Growth" . 199 

The observation room. — ^The anthropometric instru- 
ments. — Care in checking one's self. — Working manual. — 
Heights, diameters, circumferences, contours, weights. 



14 Contents 

CHAPTER PAGE 

IX. Notations to be Recorded on the Individual 

Record Card OF Growth 211 

Physiological and clinical setting of the measurements. — 
The alternations of growth and the semestral period. — 
Notations to be taken on the child stripped. — Notations to 
be taken on the child when dressed, among them color of 
eyes and of hair. — Temperament. — Relation of the duration 
of repose to the duration of effort. 

X. Determination of "Somatic Individuality" 

BY THE "Individual Formula" OF Growth 221 

The individual formula of growth and somatic indi- 
viduality. — The individual formula aims at function. — 
Make-up of the individual formula. Its interpretation. 

Bibliography 229 

Glossary 239 

Index 247 



TABLE OF PLATES 

Plate I. Proportions of the diverse segments of the body compared 

to height (= 100) at the ages of evolution . . frontispiece 

PAGE 

Plate II. The ages of evolution compared to adult age, absolute 

growth 248, 249 

Plate III. Growth of the diverse dimensions of the human body 
(solide humain) at the ages at which it doubles, trebles, quad- 
ruples 250 

Plate IV. Stature (taille). Rhythm of its elongation . . . 251 

Plate V. The ages of evolution related to adult age. Relative, 

total, and segmental growth 253 

Plate VI. Proportions of the body at ISi/g years compared to the 
proportions at 17l^ years, and at 2314 years .... 254 

Plate VII. Curves of proportional variations of the guiding-marks 

between 13i/^ years and I714 years 255 

Plate VIII. DifFerent proportions of the body in individuals of 
the same age 256 

Plate IX. Comparative schematic increase of G (germen), of 
C (cerveau-brain), of V (soma). Grand alternations . . 257 

Plate X. Semestral alternation of growth between 131/3 years and 

171/2 years 258 

Plate XI. Height erect A and height seated B of the same ten 
boys 259 

Plate XII. Check (controle) of the effects of gymnastics (height, 

perimeter, weight) 260 

Plate XIII. Check (controle) of the effects of gymnastics (diam- 
eter and girth) 261 

Plate XIV. Check (controle) of the effects of gymnastics (height, 

girth, weight) 262 

Plate XV. Guiding-marks on the skeleton and on the silhouette 

at various ages . . 264, 265 

Plate XVI. Guiding-marks . Geometric semi-silhouettes and curves 

of growth 263 



INTRODUCTION 

THE pages which follow are not a collection of num- 
bered records which had been published during the 
twelve years preceding. They are a key to the "individual 
formula," a working manual by reason of their somatic de- 
termination, and they ought rather to be entitled : "concern- 
ing growth as a means of penetrating the physical individu- 
ality of the child, and pupil." 

I have caused the practice of the method recommended 
to be preceded by a statement of the anatomico-physiolog- 
ical results which I owe to it, namely, a scientific concep- 
tion of growth, knowledge of the proportions of the body at 
the successive ages of development, analysis of puberty con- 
sidered as effect and as cause, laws of individual growth, 
etc., and some of the principal practical applications to 
which it has led me. 

For the educator who understands how to make an en- 
lightened choice, it is indispensable to know the scientific re- 
sults and the practical application due to the various meth- 
ods, and to choose one of them only after a serious exam- 
ination. 

There are two general methods for the objective study 
of the post-foetal morphological development of the child: 
the simultaneous method and the periodic method. The for- 
mer examines simultaneously, in some manner, a greater or 
les?er number of children of all ages. Each child is exam- 
ined once for all. The periodic method examines the same 

17 



18 Introduction 

child periodically throughout the successive phases of his 
development. 

The first method furnishes means useful for general com- 
parisons between different ages, between the two sexes, and 
between races ; but, whether or not it multiplies the number 
of measurements and of notations, the individual evolution 
of development remains none the less entirely outside its 
scope with all the biological phenomena which characterize 
individual evolution, and these are precisely the phenomena 
which the educator is interested in knowing. 

Since here all derives from the periodic method, it is con- 
ceived that investigations conducted according to the simul- 
taneous method have only a limited documentary role. 



PART I 



ANALYSIS OF GROWTH 



GROWTH DURING SCHOOL AGE 



CHAPTER I 

REASONS WHY GROWTH HAS A PLACE AMONG THE SUBJECTS 
TAUGHT IN A SCHOOI. OF THE SCIENCE OF EDUCATION 

School age is above all an age of growth. — Growth has a 
double influence on the cerebral function, — New in- 
struction; upon what it is based, — Outline of the data 
which the study of growth can furnish, — Its termina- 
tion is the determination of the somatic individuality of 
the child. 



SCHOOL age, according to the studies pursued, accord- 
ing to the career aimed at, may stop on the eve of 
puberty or be prolonged beyond. It can be taken as be- 
ginning with the admission to the college ^ or from the time 
of entrance into the class of the smallest children in the ma- 
ternal school (Vecole maternelle). 

School age is above all an age of growth, — School age 
extends, in reality, over the greater part of the period of 
development which the child has to traverse in order to be- 
come an adult. School life and growth parallel, and to un- 
derstand the latter thoroughly, it is of interest to trace it 
from birth. (Cf. Plates H, IV, IX, and XVI.) 

It is quite difficult to admit that school life which places 

*A secondary schoal in France. — Trl, 

21 



22 Growth During School Age 

the child in such singularly artificial conditions has no in- 
fluence on the evolution of growth. It is the duty of the 
educator to make that influence as auspicious as possible. 
His first care will be to acquire a knowledge of growth in 
order to understand its needs and to labor unceasingly to 
render school life compatible with a normal development of 
the child subject to the tortures of which school life admits. 

Growth has a twofold influence on cerebral functions. — 
School age is the period of cerebral culture. The brain is 
not an isolated organ; it forms a part of the organism of 
which it is a piece, from which it receives nutrition ; it cannot 
be dissociated from the rest of the body at any moment of 
existence; it must share the advantageous and disadvan- 
tageous conditions of life of that organism. The brain is 
really under the vegetative dependence of the organism, al- 
though relatively independent. 

In its special psychical functioning, it receives the data 
from the senses, from touch as from sight. The condition 
of these senses has an influence on their acuity, on the pre- 
cision of the information which they furnish, and it is ac- 
cording to the information that the brain estimates the 
medium, the setting that it judges of the opportuneness of 
acting, and eff*ects the first part of its functioning. 

The senses are the body itself of which they reflect the 
alternatives of well-being and of discomfort, of good health 
(euphoric) or pain, alternatives, which echo on the senses 
functioning in an inevitable fashion. The first part of the 
psycho-motor operation (Manouvrier) which is the char- 
acteristic of the brain, depends on the state itself of the 
soma, that is, on everything in the organism, which is not 
the brain. The second part of the cerebral operation bor- 
rows the instruments of which it has need, from the motor 
apparatus whose condition partakes of that of the rest of 



Study of Growth 23 

the body. How could one picture a cerebral life, a psycho- 
motor function being realized without the body? 

Among the causes capable of influencing the states of the 
organism, growth figures in the first rank during the whole 
period of elaboration of the adult. 

The term growth must be understood as applicable to all 
the modifications which concern the dimensions of the diverse 
parts of the body. It provokes continual changes in the in- 
terior conditions of organic functioning, which for the rea- 
sons just given cannot fail to aff^ect the brain indirectly. 

But the brain is itself subject to growth, and for that 
reason it undergoes modifications which would be sufficient 
to influence its functional activity. The brain is, therefore, 
tributary to growth in a twofold manner, and it is neces- 
sary for anyone who, like the educator, studies its func- 
tioning, for anyone who desires especially to grasp the di- 
rection of it, to be acquainted thoroughly with the progress 
of growth. 

New instruction; upon what it is based, — This progress 
is complex and embraces a whole evolution. It is present 
sometimes at the appearance of organs, at transformations, 
at variations in the dimensions of diverse parts of the body 
and in their reciprocal relations. It discovers to the 
methodical observer the mechanism of several phenomena 
of life with their individual character. Growth merits in- 
deed a study which admits of its analysis between two syn- 
theses. 

We are far indeed from the three measurements, height, 
girth and weight, taken as the expression of growth and 
with which the denomination of the measurement of the 
length of the body, of the thickness of the chest at a cer- 
tain point, and of the ponderal weight of the mass of the 
body agrees precisely. These are three of the hundred 



24 Growth During School Age 

twenty-nine measurements of which the metric observation 
of human growth is comprised, three measurements which 
represent two one-hundredths of the work of measuring 
only, to which are added physiological and clinical observa- 
tions composed of approximately forty-six notations. 

The results which I am presenting to you in these talks 
are based on two thousand observations, on three hundred 
thousand measurements. I do not hesitate, nevertheless, to 
ask you to verify them and to check them up as often as 
possible, when you once have possession of the processes of 
investigation which form the subject of a special chapter, 
but which continually support our lessons by the practical 
conferences which reenforce them. 

It is not a matter of your acquiring some vague the- 
oretical notions. You must be prepared to repeat the ob- 
servations for yourselves with all the exactness of which the 
scientific method admits, when once the point of departure 
has been determined among the countless obligations of lab- 
oratory research and when the working manual has been 
rendered useful by daily observation. 

This reduction of the technique is justified and valid only 
in so far as it has been preceded by patient and thorough 
investigation and as it has thus received the indispensable 
setting of notions and general ideas without which there is 
no science. Hence, you need, first of all, to be acquainted 
with results and laws, and to grasp their applications. But, 
up to the present time these are found in no study of growth. 
I shall endeavor to present to you the results, the laws and 
the applications which twenty years of research have en- 
abled me to discover. 

Your direction of education and your own instruction 
will draw a considerable benefit from these notions of growth 
because they will lead you to the discovery of the physical 



Study of Growth 25 

individuality of your pupils. Along that line you will be 
led to know the ground of each one's mentality ; you will be 
able to adapt your work as educator and teacher to the 
person of each child. You will realize the most desirable 
progress in education. 

This is the first time that growth is taught; all the mer- 
its of it will accrue to the hardy innovators who have cre- 
ated the school of the Science of Education, the J. J. Rous- 
seau Institute, and I pray them to receive the expression 
of my deepest gratitude. 

n 

The period of growth represents a long phase of the 
evolution of the human body and its life, — one-third ap- 
proximately. It corresponds with the moment of trans- 
formation, by parts and by wholes, profound and super- 
ficial, concealed and apparent, of the entire body and of each 
of its parts. 

Growth keeps up a continual ebullition of the organism 
which thus presents to the eye of the privileged observer 
of this biological phase the most intimate of its phenomena. 
Growth is "the continuous transformation which the body 
of a child undergoes in its ensemble and in each of its parts 
in order to become an adult." The term growth is the syn- 
thetic expression of all the manifestations of development.^ 

Of what countless and precious notions do those deprive 
themselves who limit growth to increase of heighth and of 
weight with or without the addition of the girth of the 
chest! Alas, the biological phenomena simplified by our 
haste to scrutinize them, often remain outside of our ob- 
servation. This is the case here. 

The program of the observation of growth is outlined 
2 Academic des Sciences — ^my contribution of Nov. 13, 1911. 



26 Growth During School Age 

by the very nature of the phenomena, and the working 
manual, by the systematic stages which the constitution 
assigns to the phenomena of growth. No one can escape it, 
unless he declares that the object of his study is such or 
such particular point of development and not growth. It 
would further be necessary to establish that the elements 
so isolated by this transforming synthesis conserve a direc- 
tion and are susceptible of an exact interpretation and ca- 
pable of being turned to account. We shall see later how 
the eunuch can, according to the three measurements, 
height, girth, and weight, be classed among the best mili- 
tary recruits. This example is to be retained and needs no 
comment. 

In no case could the observation of the individual, such 
as I propose and have proposed in my divers reports (1893- 
1905) for the examination of the French soldier for enlist- 
ment, give place to a like confusion. 

Nor is it growth, but anthropology with its general and 
some of its particular views which authors have felt con- 
strained to give as the basis for education. 

If growth borrows diverse processes from anthropology, 
it also takes different methods from statistics. It is fur- 
thermore an anatomical, physiological and clinical study. 
It is by reason of not having taken account of that fact 
that the attempts of educational and pedagogical anthro- 
pology, in spite of the worth and talent of the authors, have 
not succeeded and that nothing new or practically useful 
has been contributed from that side either to pedagogy or 
to education. On the contrary what a vast field of useful 
and fertile observations spreads out before the educator who 
gives himself up to the scientific investigation of growth ! 
What precision the multiple aspects of development suggest 
to him with regard to the individuality of the child ! 



Study of Growth 27 

Outline of the data which the study of growth can ffir- 
nish. Its termination is the determination of the somatit in- 
dividuality of the child. — The master, it is certain, is in pos- 
session of the substance of his instruction. He is trained in 
the best manner of presenting it ; he is sufficiently acquainted 
with the medium in which he is called to teach. But does he 
know each of the little plants which he is going to cultivate.'* 
does he know of what kind they are? whether they belong 
to different species and what those species are? Does he 
know above all what culture is suited to each of them, ex- 
posure, medium, food, soil, etc.? These are some of the 
cares which constantly have first place in the mind of the 
gardener; does the master have any solicitude for them? 
Have the parents, before the master, thought of it? 

We see the raising of cattle, of horses, succeed only at the 
price of a profound study of the race and the individual 
nature of each of its specimens. Do we not know that the 
horse trainer, whether he be the master of a riding-school, 
the trainer of the horse savant, of the circus horse, whether 
he have the talent of Hachet Souplet or the patience of the 
owners of Kluge Hans of Berlin and later of Elberfeld, and 
even the empiric sagacity of a tamer like Bidel or Pezon; 
do we not know that that educator of animals always be- 
gins by studying the person of his pupil and adopts the 
processes of instruction and of education, which he will em- 
ploy, only after having adapted them to the individuality 
of the animal? 

The educator of children will acquire more easily and 
more surely this science of the child, this indispensable 
knowledge of each one of his pupils if he is enabled to begin 
by making up an "individual" formula, a kind of abridged 
synthesis of the somatic individuality. 

While studying the continual variations of which the or- 



28 Growth During School Age 

ganism is the seat during the development of the child, the 
experienced educator will discern what is stable and con- 
stant in the person of his pupil. The philosopher, Mr. P. 
Bovet, has said "a question of education is at once a prob- 
lem of biology, of psychology and of sociology." ^ 

In a general way, the study of growth is that of a mov- 
ing ground of individual pedagogy. It brings to the 
teacher the following laws according to which changes "are 
produced, and reveals to him the relations in which are 
found mingled, at different moments of evolution, these 
three factors of personality, — the soma, the brain, and the 
germen. 

The following enumeration gives a general idea of the 
instruction and information which, for the educator, spring 
from the study of the development of each of his pupils and 
of which we shall consider only the principal ones in these 
lessons : 

Information concerning the state of interorganic equi- 
librium. 

Warning of disturbance of equilibrium which does not 
accompany disturbance of health. 

Information concerning the cause of a psychic disturb- 
ance, the reason for which the educator does not know. 

Information concerning the phase of development at- 
tained by each of the principal factors of the psychological 
field. 

Indication of the "educative moment," of each of the 
psychological factors, that is, of the freest period for the 
organ, consequently the most favorable for its education. 

^ Conference held at the General Assembly of the Society of Arts, 
March 14, 1913, on the founding at Geneva of a School of the Science of 
Education, by Mr. Pierre Bovet, professor of philosophy at the Uni- 
versity of Neuchatel. 



Study of Growth 29 

Warning relative to the proximity of the ages of evo- 
lution. 

Determination of the age of puberty, that is, of the dis- 
tance which still separates the child from the dawn of his 
puberty. 

Indications concerning the points which the care of the 
preparation of the ages of evolution must aim at, and con- 
cerning the opportune moment of that preparation. 

Information concerning the functional cause of asym- 
metry, of a disturbance of equilibrium, of a deviation. 

Precise formulation by the educator with an eye to the 
individual somatic appropriation of the processes of educa- 
tion and pedagogy. 

Data permitting the checking up of the results of a 
regime, of an educative and pedagogical method, of a proc- 
ess of physical culture. 

Data concerning the duration of the periods of repose 
necessary for recuperation of energy (alternations). 

Indication of the "stuff" of which the infant disposes. 

Indication of the point, organ, segment, function where 
special, intensive culture must bear when it is a question of 
specializing the work, or of correcting a wrong direction or 
of remedying a short-coming. 

Description of the effects of transgression of the phases 
of repose (alternation) in consequence of too rapid growth; 
in consequence of infection or of traumatism ; in consequence 
of cerebral superactivity. 

Notice of having to prolong the periods of repose of 
which the educator disposes. 

Precise notion of the distance, often remote, at which 
are manifested the effects of a verified cause, for, the greater 
part of short-comings which are observed among young peo- 



30 Growth During School Age 

pie of both sexes between the ages of fifteen and twenty 
years, are only remote effects of faulty preparation for 
puberty, etc. ... 

Let us beware of falling into the error so frequent among 
biologists and physicians, which Bergson stigmatises, 
namely, never treat in any case "the living as the inert." 
Let us listen to that cry of the great poet, the only one who 
since Jean Jacques Rousseau, has understood infancy. 
"One does not know, one does not have the appearance of 
knowing that infancy forms a part of life." * 

Growth preserves us precisely from this fault; creative 
cause of incessant transformations, of continual changes, 
it does not at a single moment, permit the biologist, the 
physician or the educator to lose the notion of mutation, 
the feeling of life in the being which forms the object of his 
observation. 

*Jean Aicard, of the French Academy, L'dme d'lm enfant. 



CHAPTER II 

METHOD OF STUDY OF GROWTH OR AUXANOLOGICAL METHOD 

Methods not to follow. — Worthies sness of isolated measure- 
ments. — Measurement of stature becomes useful as soon 
as it is introduced. — Rhythm of the lengthening of the 
body. — What is adolescence? The great post-foetal 
lengthening of the body by the lower limbs takes place 
between birth and the age of seven years, and not at the 
time of puberty. — The method to follow is that which 
the nature of the phenomena and the utilitarian objec- 
tive of the results of observation dictate. 

METHODS not to follow. — The continued transforma- 
tion which growth bears along with it in the body of 
children cannot be studied as if it were a fixed state. Ob- 
servation needs to be renewed often so as to verify the 
changes which have occurred. That implies a periodical 
examination of the children, a fact which is far from having 
been understood by all the authors. The numerous neces- 
sary examinations have been reduced to a single one, made 
once for all. 

The reductions have been worked out on the measurements, 
reductions sucli that of the relatively few measurements 
taken by Quetelet, there has now and then remained only 
the measure of height. The fact of considering height as 
the only useful measure of length has some very grave con- 
sequences. Simply reading the results furnished by the 

31 



32 Growth During School Age 

working up of measurements sufficiently numerous makes 
the liability of error perfectly obvious. 

Height is, in effect, the sum of the lengths of the lower 
limbs, the trunk, the neck, and the skull. Each of these 
parts has, functionally, a role different from the others ; 
each of these segments participates in the total lengthen- 
ing of one part which is peculiar to itself and differs from 
that of the segments situated above and beneath. We shall 
even see that a law controls these differences. 

This segmental growth has some correlations which are 
more or less changed as soon as the said segment grows less 
or more. The relations which express a certain number of 
correlations change with them; the interpretations rela- 
tive to the conditions of life in the organism of the child 
observed are profoundly different and lead to some deduc- 
tions quite different in preventive hygiene and in education 
and pedagogy. 

Worthlessness of isolated measurements. — ^Let us recog- 
nize that all isolated measurements are worth nothing; for, 
even as a solid (globale), growth has still to consider all the 
dimensions of the solid human body (Plate III) ; and fatally 
erroneous, in matter of development of the body of man, are 
the interpretations of a measurement which represents only 
one of these dimensions. The measurement of stature 
teaches us that a person is large or small. That is not 
enough. Weight does not teach us much more if it has 
only that of stature to complete its total. For its valuation 
is increased by the presence of fat as well as by the density 
of muscular tissue or that of osseous tissue. 

One day there were brought to me two children, one a 
boy of fourteen and his sister aged eleven. The mother was 
greatly disturbed by their emaciation ; the one had lost two 
kilos and the other one and one-half kilos in ten days. This 



The Auxanological Method 33 

was, in fact, considerable, because if children of that age do 
not gain in weight each day like infants at the breast, they 
must nevertheless augment by a sufficiently regular and ap- 
preciable monthly quantity. But these ten days had been 
spent in a vacation outing and the reductive effect mani- 
fested itself with the two children in equivalent proportions. 
I had these emaciated youngsters placed in complete re- 
pose, with a diet of a nature to flatter their tastes, two 
short promenades each day, without running or play, and, 
providing my prescription were followed, I told the mother 
that ten days would suffice to regain the lost kilos. 

The little girl regained the kilo and a half and several 
hundred grams in addition. The boy did not quite attain 
to his two lost kilos but he lacked very little. Quite soon 
they returned to their habitual activities. 

Nothing profound, nothing organic had been attacked in 
those two children. The change of regime and of habit, the 
strenuous {haletante) life which those little bands lead in 
order not to miss a train, in order to have time to visit this 
or that place, impose a certain superactivity on their econ- 
omy. To the food which the regime of the journey, the con- 
versations with their comrades or haste often reduces a lit- 
tle too much, the little excursionists find themselves obliged 
to add their reserve. It is this reserve which is formed by 
the interstitial adipose tissue. 

There is relatively little interstitial fat at this age and 
you see nevertheless what variations of weight its diminu- 
tion alone can carry with it. The oscillations of weight 
which one is called weekly or monthly to verify in children 
who are well, and even in young people, are most often at- 
tributable to fat alternately taken up and redeposited by 
the economy which thus balances its nutrition. 

It would also be necessary in order to interpret the weigh- 



34 Growth During School Age 

ing in an accurate fashion, to know the relation between the 
fattiness and the mass of the body throughout the varia- 
tions of weight. This is what Mailing Hansen appears to 
have sought, who weighed several times a day each of the 
little deaf mutes of his institution. But by reason of the 
special conditions of the life of these poor children, the re- 
sults could not be generally applied. Thus in the interpre- 
tation of the value of weight in the child in the course of his 
growth, it happens that one takes for an active value what 
is only an obstacle or at the most, a reserve. 

The measurement of stature becomes useful as soon as it 
is introduced. — Supported by other measurements in suf- 
ficient number, weight becomes one of the most important in- 
dications. Isolated, the two measurements of stature and 
weight have no useful signification capable of being inter- 
preted by the educator. 

Perhaps the isolated measurement of stature exposes it- 
self to more notorious errors of interpretation than weigh- 
ing if one judges from the contradictions offered by the re- 
sults of various authors. From that source springs the un- 
reliability of judgments based on measurement of stature, 
unless that measurement has been made on the same child 
at some fixed epochs, the later checking up the preceding, 
as BufFon, Quetelet, Carlier, and Mailing Hansen have done. 
These authors have, in this manner, introduced this meas- 
urement into the progress of individual growth and have 
thus caused to be expressed a real evolution although too 
comprehensive to have a clear meaning. 

Rhythm of lengthening of the body. — In the midst of 
analytic measurements, that of stature acquires the import 
of a synthetic value, and it is necessary to know its rhythm. 
(Plate IV.) The schematic curve above shows that a stat- 
ure of fifty centimeters at birth, doubles at about the age 



The Auxcmological Method 35 

of five years, a period at which it attains one meter, and 
trebles when the child reaches his fifteenth year. Although 
it has required only five years in the little child to increase 
his stature fifty centimeters, reckoning from the moment of 
his birth, an equal lengthening requires afterwards ten 
years, from the age of five to fifteen years, to be realized. 
Before his birth, on the contrary, nine months had sufficed 
to give to the body of the foetus the first half meter. 

According to the graph of Plate IV, beyond fifteen years, 
on the morrow of his puberty consequently, the child grows 
a relatively insignificant amount in height, namely, fifteen 
centimeters in five years, say, three centimeters a year, 
while each year between five and fifteen had added to the 
stature an average increase of five centimeters. More ac- 
tive had been the increase of height of stature from birth 
to the age of five years, a period during which each year had 
added ten centimeters to the earlier acquisition. Before 
birth, the interuterine elongation is incomparably more 
rapid still. Monthly, the embryo-foetus lengthens by more 
than five centimeters ; that is, only one month of inter- 
uterine life suffices to gain in stature as much as six months 
of extra-uterine life. 

What is adolescence? — ^With what period of the child's 
life does the term adolescence coincide? If we should give 
to the word adolescence its original sense, namely, period of 
growth, "adolescere," to grow, and if we should refer the 
matter only to increase of stature in order to determine the 
time of that period, we should logically have to designate 
under the word, adolescence, the whole span of the child's 
life without excluding from it the period from birth to five 
years and still less the embryo-foetal or inter-uterine phase. 

Usage is, in a manner, in great contradiction with logic, 
and the best thing would perhaps be to suppress a word 



36 Growth During School Age 

so completely turned aside from its real sense. But it is 
acknowledged that the term, adolescence, is applicable to 
the last phase of childhood, to the peripubescent phase, and 
that it denotes especially the last relatively insignificant 
thrust of the lengthening of the body by the lower limbs. 
(Plate III.) 

I have employed the word, adolescent, in this sense in 
describing "the adolescent type at different puberal ages." 
It corresponds to prepubescent and pubescent; possibly one 
could use for its limits, the limits themselves of puberty : the 
the child becomes adolescent when the first hairs appear on 
the pubis, P-^, and ceases to be adolescent with P^ on be- 
coming a young man ("jeune homme"). (v. "Phases of 
Life," p. 103.) 

As to stature, considered from the point of view of the 
method to be employed in the study of growth, had it been 
followed carefully from semester to semester or even from 
month to month what could it not have taught us concern- 
ing the conditions of its own increase, what could it not have 
taught us concerning the advantage or disadvantage which 
its extension confers on the organism, because it is impos- 
sible to inform ourselves whether the segments which have 
elongated are of vital or accessory parts ; whether the 
elongation has been in the bust or in the lower limbs. 

As soon as measurements are judiciously multiplied; as 
soon as the increase of each of the principal segments can 
be brought out by anthropometric study, the explanations 
of the rhythm of increase of stature will be found. 

It is recognized, as the graph of Plate III shows, that 
the contribution of the trunk is quite superior to that of the 
pelvic members during two periods : before birth, next, after 
puberty ; whereas the lower limbs take in the course of these 



The Auxanological Method 37 

two periods only a relatively feeble part in the increase of 
stature. 

The great post-foetal lengthening of the body takes place 
between birth and the age of seven years. — On the other 
hand, between birth and the age of seven years, the increase 
of the lower limbs presents the greatest activity ; their length 
doubles between birth and the age of four years, and three 
more years are sufficient to treble it. 

If, in the superficial observation of the children around 
us, we note in the fact of important increase in the legs, 
only that which precedes puberty, it is that the child then 
presents a stature which approaches our own and that our 
own stature serves as a standard of comparison in order to 
appreciate the progress of the child. In reality, the great 
thrust of elongation in the lower limbs takes place very ex- 
actly between birth and the age of seven years, and that in 
a continuous fashion in the child which presents a normal 
constitution. 

From birth till about two years the increase affects 
rather the framework of the body because the child deserts 
the arms of the nurse who carried him and moves about on 
his own legs. But from two years to eight or ten,, there is 
no guiding-mark save for one or another who makes the 
clothes with which, in disregard of the needs of nature and 
advice of Herbert Spencer, the baby is tricked out as soon 
as he leaves his cradle. 

The method to follow is that which the nature of the phe- 
nomena and the utilitarian objective of the results of ob- 
servation dictate. — We already perceive by this example the 
nature of the information furnished by true anthropometric 
observation of the child. We understand that growth is a 
thing other than a linear development ; we foresee that each 



38 Growth During School Age 

of the many parts of which the body is composed, grows 
for its own sake, aside from the increase which each part 
reaHzes in the most advantageous direction for the entire 
economy, and we conceive the interest which there is, for the 
educator as for the physician, in knowing the variations 
and the laws of this partial development. 

One is prepared to understand better the real meaning 
of the term ''growth," "continuous transformation which a 
child's body undergoes in its ensemble and in each of its 
parts in order to become an adult," which gives to its study 
a setting, at once precise, far-reaching, and, what is espe- 
cially important to us at this moment, marks out clearly 
the method to be followed which we can formulate thus: 
An individual periodic and poly metric method, if one can 
express by this term the multiplicity of measurements. 

Expressed otherwise, half-yearly examination of the same 
children from the time when they come into the hands of the 
educator and continued as long as he has them in his charge ; 
an anthropometric examination by a number of measure- 
ments sufficient in kind that each one will find in the others 
the complement and support which it needs in order to con- 
tribute to the expression of the anatomical condition of a 
function; a physiological and psychological examination; 
the clinical part admitting only of the recording of the re- 
sults of the examination worked out according to the same 
method by the physician. 

It is to this combined method of the educator and of the 
physician, an auxanological method, rigorously employed 
during long years, that are due the results which follow, 
with their practical character* 



CHAPTER III 

METRICAL, PROPORTIONS OF THE BODY OF THE CHILD FROM 

BIRTH TO ADULT AGE 

The proportions of the human body and the artists of 
Egypt, of Greece, of Rome, of the Middle Ages; con- 
temporary artists, — Anthropometric canon of the 
child at different ages. — Influence of growth on the 
variations of the proportions of the body, — Partial pro- 
portions. — Importance of functional correlations. 



THE proportions of the human body and the artists of 
Egypt, of Greece, of Rome, of the Middle Ages; con- 
temporary artists. — In the study of the proportions of the 
adult, the artists of every period have taken for a standard 
measure a segment of the body; the height was nineteen 
times the length of the middle finger in the Egyptian canon, 
which was probably also the Greek canon (Broca thought 
so), though Polycletus, a contemporary of Phidias, does 
not mention it in his treatise on symmetry, written four 
centuries and a half B.C. 

With Vitruvius, the Romans found eight heads in the 
height of the body. Jean Cousin, then the anatomists since 
Andry and later Gerdy until Paul Richer, the eminent pro- 
fessor at the School of Fine Arts, himself a great artist, 
have followed their example. 

However, with the beginning of the fifteenth century 

39 



40 Growth During School Age 

there appeared the first attempt to employ a standard meas- 
ure taken from outside the human body. L. B. Alberti, in his 
work "Delia Architectura" recommends fifty-two measure- 
ments which relate to the three dimensions of the body, its 
height, its breadth, and its thickness. Alberti has recourse 
to a sort of decimal system which has for its basis a con- 
ventional length. "It is, in short," said Topinard, "an es- 
say at rational anthropology and an attempt quite remark- 
able for the time." 

Forty years later, Leonardo da Vinci expresses the wish 
that a special study be made of the proportions of the 
child's body. It seems, indeed, that that great artist was 
the first who understood that the body of the child was not 
merely a reduction of that of the man ; that it had very dif- 
ferent proportions and presented for that reason a spe- 
cial artistic anatomy. 

Albert Diirer essayed to realize the counsel of his con- 
temporary and established the proportions according to 
age and sex, but unfortunately he abandoned the standard 
measure proposed by Alberti. He returned, in effect, to 
the measurement of the body by the measure of the height 
of the head, and applied to the child the Roman canon, that 
of Vitruvius. 

In order to find the application of the meter -^ to the 
evaluation of the proportions of the adult human body, it 
is necessary to go to the authoritative anthropometric stud- 
ies of Manouvrier. 

Manouvrier's pupil, Papillault, has followed his method in 
the latter's important study of the average man in Paris 
and has given, according to the cadaver, a great precision 

^ Admitted as the basis of measurements in France from April 7, 1795 
(18 Germinal. An III.)> and rendered legal November 2, 1801. 



Proportions of the Body 41 

to the relations between them of the different parts of the 
body in adults of the two sexes. 

Anthropometric canon of the child at different ages. — ^As 
to the child at different ages of his development, I have been 
able to establish the proportions of his body by relating to 
the stature each of the dimensions of length and of breadth 
of the different segments (Plate V.), and representing those 
proportions in thousandths parts of the height reduced to 
a thousand millimeters, to one hundred centimeters, that is, 
to a meter. ^ 

It is to be hoped that the demonstrative figures which 
have been constructed according to the millimetric notions, 
will contribute to have the meter substituted for the con- 
ventional measurements. The plate of Stratz, which is 
found reproduced in divers works, owing to the employment 
of the height of the head as the standard m^easure, devi- 
ates, in fact, notably from reality. I have indicated on 
page 25 of my study of proportions some of the errors of 
Stratz and their rectification by means of the metrical meas- 
urement. 

II 

With Plate V we find ourselves in the presence of all the 
partial developments such as are effected from birth to 
adult age, and which constitute truly relative growth. In 
this plate thicknesses (and circumferences) are not shown. 
A figurative representation of these could be made only by 
the processes of sculpturing. We are able to follow the ex- 
tra-uterine ontogeny with the variations which, by hered- 
ity and environment, it expresses in skeletal, muscular, and 

2"Les Proportions du corps pendant la croissance," 6 figures and 9 
tables, 1910, work crowned by the Academy of Medicine. Larrey Prize, 
1913. Paris, A, Maloine, publisher, 



42 Growth During School Age 

segmentary dimensions, variations which are considered here 
only in their relation with stature. 

Up to the present, we have studied the proportions of 
the adolescent, beginning with the age of thirteen and one- 
half years, which, in the average boy, precedes by two years 
the age of the appearance of the first signs of puberty. We 
have seen that these variations are relatively insignificant. 
Plate V, on the contrary, takes the child at his birth and 
shows some relative variations of great extent. The plate 
is sufficiently expressive by itself so that a few explanations 
will suffice for its interpretation. The same holds in the 
case of Plate I. 

It is known that between birth and the age of six and 
one-half years, the first and second periods of infancy elapse 
while the third period of infancy extends from six and one- 
half years to fifteen and one-half, the average age of puberty. 
This exact division has been proposed by Marian (Semaine 
medicale of November 21, 1896, number 59) and deserves to 
be conserved for the reason given by the author to which are 
also added divers ontogentic motives.^ 

The age of seventeen and one-half years closes the period 
properly called pubescent and opens the internubilo-pubes- 
cent phase whose limits and characteristics have been traced 
in my communication of July 9, 1909, to the Anthropolog- 
ical Society of Paris (meeting of the fiftieth anniversary). 

Finally comes the semi-silhouette of the adult at twenty- 
three and one-half years. These are the five ages portrayed 
in the plates I and V. 

The measurements of the new-born child are obtained in 
a rapid and simple fashion by means of the measuring ap- 

^ One must, however, acknowledge a fourth phase of infancy, the 
pubescent phase, which extends to the two years necessary for the 
inauguration of puberty, from fifteen and one-half to seventeen and 
one-half, on the average. 



Proportions of the Body 43 

paratus which I had made under the name of "auxano- 
metre" ^ and of which the lower half is instantly transformed 
into a horizontal measuring apparatus. 

The height and breadth of all the segments of the body 
are, in effect, for the first time studied metrically in their re- 
lation to stature in the new-born child and in the child of 
six and one-half years. The proportions are studied as 
such. In determining these proportions there is no inter- 
vention of preconceived notions which prompt us to attempt 
to discover a segment susceptible of being utilized to meas- 
ure the others. 

Plates I and V show that the chin of the new-born child 
does not descend to the lower extremity of the sternum, not 
even to the nipple of the adult, but corresponds only, to the 
mid-point of the sternum of the latter. For a more cogent 
reason, the proportional height of the head diminishing with 
age, the correspondence of chin to nipple cannot exist later, 
just as the figure due to Strata and cited by Cruchet in his 
remarkable article entitled: "The Child from Two Years to 
Puberty," from the "Pratique des Maladies des Enfants," 
vol. I, p. 382, would lead one to believe. 

This same figure presents, for example, the ascent of the 
great trochanter as wonderfully regular and attaining its 
culminating point in the adult. Now, this relative culminat- 
ing point is in reality attained in the adolescent of fifteen 
and one-half years. 

Likewise, Stratz thought he was obliged to proportion 
each of the segments of the lower limbs to the stature and 
to increase by a proportional quantity the thigh and the 
leg in proportion to the aging of the child. It is quite 
otherwise that things take place: proportionally to stature, 
the thigh changes very little, while the tibia doubles in 
* Deposited with Maloine fils, rue Casimir Delavigne, Paris. 



44 Growth During School Age 

length from birth to fifteen and one-half years. In the up- 
per limbs the same phenomenon is verified; the forearm 
lengthens proportionally by more than a third of its length 
in passing from zero to fifteen and one-half years, and dur- 
ing this time the relative lengthening of the arm is insig- 
nificant. 

That is a surprising fact to those who expect an aug- 
mentation of each segment of a limb, proportional to the in- 
crease in stature. Observation shows that, contrary to this 
theoretic conception, a single segment, the distal, procures 
for the superior limb its proportional elongation, between 
birth and puberty. 

The pubis gives rise lo an important remark: instead of 
being subjacent to the bitrochanteric line as represented 
for all other ages, the pubis is situated in the newly born 
above the bitrochanteric line. 

The basin should be then the seat of two successive move- 
ments in opposite direction. The first, having for effect, 
the lowering of the pubis, was taking place from the time of 
birth on. Then from six and one-half years on, an inverse 
swing with an elevation of the level of the pubis was no- 
ticed. This fact, singular in certain respects, can be con- 
sidered as established only after checking up by some new 
series and also by anatomical relations which are better able 
than the relations to height to establish a fact of this order. 

The height of the entire trunk of the new-born child is 
proportionally quite superior to that of later ages. The 
same is true, obviously, of the greater part of the segments 
of the trunk. We note the most striking differences on com- 
paring in Plate V, the first semi-silhouette with the second 
and third; the height of the thorax of the newly born is ex- 
cessive; the position of the nipple equidistant from the 
furculum and the crest of the sternum, is quite different 



Proportions of the Body 45 

from that in the two following semi-silhouettes; its neck is 
shorter by a fourth than it will be at six and one-half years, 
a period at which it will have in relation to stature the same 
length as at twenty- three and one-half years. 

Instead of meeting the bust below the pubis as in the 
large boy and in man, the middle of the body is found be- 
tween the iliac spine and the pubis of the six-year-old child. 

In the child at birth, the bust represents sixty-six hun- 
dredths of the total height of the body. The horizontal 
plane which corresponds to the centre of the body cuts it at 
a point equally distant from the crest of the iliac and the 
angle of the tenth rib. But the neck shows a width which 
will not be found present at any other age; and which con- 
tinues to diminish until puberty. 

Other proportions of breadth are similar to those of the 
neck. They are quite superior at the moment of birth and 
continue to diminish until puberty. Beyond fifteen and one- 
half years we know how they behave. But the variations 
of the cranium, in function of size, in height as well as in 
breadth, are particularly striking, and give by themselves 
the principal relief to Plate V. The cranium offers the 
rare example in the organism of a magnitude modifying it- 
self throughout the years in a regular fashion. It is a 
matter, in a way, of a relative decrease. That means sim- 
ply that the brain of the child is, from birth, much nearer 
its adult dimensions than any other organ and that its con- 
tent has much less need to grow than does stature. 

The grand spread of the arms (envergure) offers only a 
feeble anthropometric interest. It is complex, in fact, and 
each of the elements which constitute it has been measured 
for its own sake. However, the grand spread (envergure) 
is not a matter of indifference to artists who sometimes have 
occasion to look at it in its ensemble, the superior limbs be- 



46 Growth During School Age 

ing extended in the plane of the clavicles. Besides, its re- 
lations to stature are often invoked in support of divers 
theses. 

The following are then the relations to size of that mag- 
nitude which surpasses stature itself, except in the baby and 
in seven out of one hundred adolescents and adults. It is 
to be remarked that of the seven per cent, one only is 
brachyskeletal while the six others are mesatiskeletal. 

Grand spread (envergure) expressed in thousandths of stature. 

Infant at birth 92A 

Child of 61/2 years 101. 

Adolescent of I51/2 years 103. 

of 171/2 " 103. 

Adult of 23 years 106.1 

These relations have been established from the fixed aver- 
ages of series of subjects belonging to diverse regions and 
to different social strata. 

By relative dimension, — and here is an important point of 
our study where everything is analysis of relations, 
anatomo-physiological expression of very numerous corre- 
lations — by relative dimension is understood the comparison 
of each partial length, evaluated anthropometrically, to the 
total length. 

If it is a question of the leg, for example, the total length 
to which one relates it may be the stature, just as I have 
done in the study of the proportions, but this total length 
may just as well be the length of the lower limb, its height 
above the ground, of which the leg represents a part. 

From the point of view properly called anatomical, it is 
different: a segment is compared to another above or below 
it, or again to the homologous segment of the thoracic mem- 
ber, that is, to the forearm, if it is a question of the leg; 
but one must avoid relating it to a length, whether it be the 



Proportions of the Body 47 

stature or the inferior member, to an entire (globale) length 
of which the segment studied formed a part. 

Thus, one will not compare the leg to the stature, unless 
for special purposes such as guided me in the study of "pro- 
portions," one will not compare the leg to the total length 
of the inferior members, because in one case as in the other 
the proper height of the leg represents a part of the di- 
mension to which it is related and that thus one part of the 
quotient would represent the relation of the leg to the leg 
which is nonsense. 

Practically, it is admitted that the greater of the two 
dimensions, and this applies to the dimensions of breadth 
as to the dimensions of length, is equal to 100, (by meter) 
so that the fraction obtained gives in centimeters or in milli- 
meters (in hundredths or thousandths of a meter) the rela- 
tive dimension of the part compared. 

If we proceed by this comparison in the same child, meas- 
ured six times, in six consecutive half-years, and if there 
are brought together the divers half-yearly results of the 
same relation, the change progressively realized is verified. 

The proportions are modified, and each of the parts or 
segments of the body has taken dimensions absolutely or 
relatively different according to the importance, greater or 
less, of its functional role in the advance of the organism 
toward its state of perfection, 

rn 

Influence of growth on the variations of the proportions 
of the body, — Growth has a considerable influence on the 
proportions of the body which it causes to vary within lim- 
its often widely extended. The following are the general 
considerations to which these variations give place, such as 



48 Growth During School Age 

I have formulated in a communication to the Academy of 
Medicine (session of June 27, 1911). 

Growth modifies in a constant fashion the centesimal re- 
lations to the stature of each of the segmentary lengths and 
widths of the body of man at three different ages: birth, 
six years, and fifteen years. 

Now, from my researches published up to the present time, 
it results that the evolution of the variations of these rela- 
tions is dominated by some laws of incontestible anatomical 
and physiological interest. I state them here briefly ac- 
cording to my communication on the same subject at the 
session of the Academy of Science, June 19, 1911. 

Nature and the extent of the variations. — In passing from 
birth of the child to manhood, each segment makes its own 
contribution to stature. Plates I and V. The cranium 
and the trunk both lose in length and breadth, the former 
more than the latter: "cranium, ten hundredths in both di- 
rections; trunk, nine hundredths in length and four hun- 
dredths in width." 

The neck loses three hundredths in diameter but gains 
two hundredths in height. 

The superior limbs gain six hundredths. 

The lower limbs gain seventeen hundredths, but only until 
puberty. Beyond that, they lose one hundredth. 

Alternation of variations. — It follows that if proportional 
increase is superior to that of stature for one segment of 
the body, it is inferior to it for the segment situated imme- 
diately below or above. Here is a new aspect of the law 
of alternation which I formulated in 1902 after observa- 
tion of the growth of bones, in my '^Researches on Growth 
in Different Parts of the Body." (Recherches sur la crois- 
sance des diverses parties du corps.) 



Proportions of the Body 49 

Change of direction of variations, — ^A segment which pro- 
gresses relatively more than the stature up to puberty, re- 
tards beyond the age of puberty ; this is the case of the pel- 
vic member. Such other segment the growth of which is 
relatively slower than stature before puberty, gains on it 
when puberty is passed over. 

It is thus that the relations to the size of the width of the 
neck, of the height of the thorax, of the height of the in- 
ferior or iliac abdomen, of the height of the ischio-pubic seg- 
ment, of the width of the basin, of the length of the arm 
(humeral segment), of the height of the trunk in its ensem- 
ble behave. Plates VI and VII. 

Puberty has then a decisive influence on the direction 
of variations, on their orientation. It possesses besides, on 
the proportional increases, an augmenting (majorative) ac- 
tion already noted apropos the absolute increases. 

Phases of evolution of variations. — The evolution of va- 
riations presented by the proportions of length and breadth 
of the body is distributed by itself among three phases, pre- 
senting a difl'erent activity of growth ; the first phase ceases 
at six years, a period at which six-tenths are traversed, 
and, for some proportions nine-tenths of the augmentation 
or diminution of the proportional increase; in such a way 
that the silhouette, at this age, indicates already what it 
will be in the adult. The second phase extends from six 
years to puberty; the third terminates at the adult age, at 
nubility. The most active for the proportional enlarging 
of the body, the last, is at the same time the least active 
for its proportional elongation. Plates I, V, VI and VII. 
The opposite takes place during the first phase; the second 
phase, the middle, is only a lessened sequel of the first. That 
constitutes so many applications of the law of alternations. 



50 Growth During School Age 

Conclusions. — 1. There are three phases in the evolution 
of the variations presented bj the proportions of length and 
of breadth of the body. 

The first from birth to six years. 

The second from six to fifteen years. 

The third from fifteen years to adult age. 

2. The "law of alternation" governs the proportional in- 
creases of the segments of the body, as it governs their ab- 
solute increases. 

3. The variations of the proportions of length and of 
width of the body in the two sexes are profoundly modified 
by puberty which subjects them to its laws of orientation 
and increase. 

4. The proportions of breadth, in general, present some 
peculiar variations which are correlated with those of the 
proportions of length of the trunk. 

Partial proportions. — Along with the relations to stat- 
ure which we have just analyzed, the educator cannot be dis- 
interested in the intersegmentary relations which are more- 
over properly called anatomical relations because it is these 
relations which constitute the essential part of the indi- 
vidual formula of growth. 

The first place, among these intersegmentary relations, 

S 
comes back to the relation — • of Manouvrier. 

B represents the bust, that is, the whole part of the body 
which rises from the plane of the seat of the subject sitting. 
On taking away this height from that of the stature erect, 
S is obtained which answers to a reduced length of the lower 
limbs. 

On classifying the series of children in accordance with 
this relation, there are seen to group themselves, on one side 



Proportions of the Body 51 

the "short legs," on the other the "long legs" and between 

the average legs. Plate VIII. 

With the "short legs" is associated a long bust in order 

to constitute the brachjskeletal. The brachyskeletal child 

of thirteen and one-half years ^ who is especially charac- 

S 
terized by the relation -- of which the quotient oscillates 

B 

in his case around 87, offers numerous anatomical and physi- 
ological correlations of this relation. 

When the legs {legs in the sense of lower limbs) are long, 
they are associated with a short bust (necessarily, since 
according to the constituent of the relation, it is by com- 
parison with the bust . that the lower members are called 
long or short) and the macroskele is made up. It is trans- 

lated by the relation ^ = 96 (from 94 to 98 and above). 

B 

In the macroskele, the correlations of the relation 

are very different from what they are in the brachyskele, and 
even in the average or mesatiskele of whom the relation os- 
cillates around 90. Plate VIII. 

S 
From puberty, especially, the quotient is lowered in 

proportion as the child advances toward the adult state, 
proving some functional correlations of this relation. 

It is in the child specially that the educator has reasons 
to interest himself in this relation which plays an important 
part in the individual formula. 

Importance of functional correlations. — Later, when we 

^Dr. Poutrin, assistant in anthropology at the Paris Museum of Nat- 
ural History, found a brachyskele much more accentuated than that 
of the child of thirteen and one-half, in a tribe of pigmies of Belgian 
Congo. "Les Negrilles du centre africain," L'anthropologie, tome XXII, 
nos. 4-5, 1911. 



52 Growth During School Age 

shall study the make-up of the individual formula of 
growth, we shall utilize again the intersegmentary rela- 
tions, but in a slightly different fashion, owing to our domi- 
nant prepossession of function: we shall compare among 
them some capacities. The research of functional correla- 
tions will lead us sometimes to compare a thickness or a 
length to a volume and there will spring from it some im- 
portant information for educational or pedagogical ad- 
ministration. 

The measures which we have placed on the individual 
record card, supply to us other factors of relations which 
we shall always be interested in calculating in view of the 
direct and immediate information which they can procure 
for us, in view of the comparison of their quotient with that 
of the same relation in other children, or with itself in the 
same child some half-years later. Such are: the relation 
of the length of the foot to the height of the lower limbs; 
the relation of the length of the lower limbs to the height 
of the trunk (distance from sternal furcula to the pubis 
or vertical diameter of the trunk) ; the relation of the 
height of the trunk to the length of the neck or to that 
of every other segment of the body, cranium, foot or hand, 
or superior limbs ; the relation of the length of the superior 
limbs to the length of the inferior limbs, the relations 
of the breadth to the height of some segments, such as the 
foot, the hand, the trunk, the cranium. 

The educator who exercises his activity in multiple direc- 
tions, will be interested in preoccupying himself with these 
diverse relations only so far as he will be invited thereto by 
the individual functional correlations, leaving to the physi- 
cian the care of estimating the digression of the development 
which he might believe ought to be indicated to him. 



CHAPTER IV 

INFLUENCES WHICH ACT UPON GROWTH 

Influences which act upon stature. — Influence of food, of 
4 sex, of race, of heredity, of season, of gestation, of 
exercise* — Influence of function of reproduction, 

INFLUENCES which act upon stature, — The studies 
which have been made up to the present time of the 
influences which act upon growth have borne only on height 
alone or on height and weight. 

We have seen how far height fell short of representing 
"growth" of the body, of expressing what scientific analysis, 
on the one hand, and educational application, on the other, 
can and must understand by "growth." 

If certain influences act upon height and augment it, 
are they to be investigated by the educator.'' The educator, 
in order to solve this question, will commence by render- 
ing to himself an account of the organic and biological 
value of height, of the individual value consequently, in 
the next place, of its social and economic value. He will 
investigate the output in useful work, of people according 
to height, and he will soon have caused to be recognized 
throughout history that the races of small or medium 
stature furnish an output often superior, at least equal, to 
that of races of tall stature. 

That might appear to be in contradiction with certain 
facts of modern and contemporary history, but this im- 
pression will not withstand a more searching analysis of 

53 



54 Growth During School Age 

the conditions and mechanism of output by which voluntary 
work is differentiated from forced work. 

They are no longer slaves whom we see at work, but 
peoples of other nationalities as is observed on English 
merchant packets, for example, while we see only Japanese 
on Japanese packets. Anglo-Saxon wealth springs in part 
from India, and from the Cape where the workmen are 
negroes, Hindus and Chinese. 

If the arms belong to men of small or medium races, are 
men of tall stature who command, who direct, perhaps more 
richly endowed from the point of view of cerebral quantity? 
The answer is given us by these lines ^ of L. Manouvrier 
whose excellent studies on the brain are known and appre- 
ciated in the scientific circles of the whole world : "The quali- 
tative superiority (of the brain) is a condition of intellec- 
tual superiority; the quantitative superiority is another 
thing, morphological superiority is still another. And it 
is because there are some diverse anatomical conditions in 
relation with the intellectual superiority that any of these 
conditions would not be, singly, a sufficient base to evalu- 
ate the intellectual superiority," and further on: "The 
average of these 62 Parisians, all very tall, is equal to 1365 
grams. ^ One could, therefore, explain hy even a very great 
superiority of height, and otherwise not demonstrated, only 
a part of the quantitative cerebral superiority of the se- 
ries of distinguished men." 

It is not, we may conclude, because the race is of tall 
stature that it necessarily possesses a more voluminous 
brain, and should the race possess it, that would not be a 
sufficient guarantee of intellectual superiority. The con- 

^ "Dictionnaire de Physiologie," Charles Richet, 3rd part, Vol. II, pp. 
672, 688, 689. 

'Weight very near the average weight of the adult brain in general 
(V. Vierordt, Boyd, Manouvrier). 



Influences which Act on Growth 55 

elusion is that the educator is not at all to seek intellectual 
superiority for his pupils in the superiority of stature. 

But it would suffice that he be able to anticipate height 
as a factor of health and strength in order that he might 
be authorized to "cultivate the elongation of the body.'' 
Now, every one knows that the vigor of the organism is 
ordinarily manifested by the importance of the other di- 
mensions of the body, breadth, thickness, bulk, but not by 
the height, unless this be unaccompanied by the others. 

The dimensions which correspond in a high degree to 
organic force are the natural adjunct of mountaineers, agri- 
cultural laborers, porters, and those men are not generally 
distinguished by the height of their stature. 

To what influences, moreover, is the increase of height of 
a boy or girl beyond the limits set by heredity due? In other 
words, what are the conditions which cause a child to grow 
larger than the father and mother? What ^ observe every 
day, leaves us hardly any doubt on this subject, and, on the 
other hand, statistics show it. It is not at all in the country 
that the descendents gain in stature over the progenitors. 
It is in the city ; life in apartments, life at college, favor the 
superiority in stature of the child over his parents. Exag- 
gerated increase in height is as well the effect of cloistering, 
of insufficient air, of activity and of light, as is constantly 
shown in children who rise from the sick bed after a long 
illness. The increase of height is in all these cases the 
result of the growth in length of the long bones of the 
lower limbs. The bust takes only an inappreciable share 
in it as measurements in convalescents have demonstrated 
to me. 

According to our analysis of the increase of height and 
of the increase of its constituent elements, we know that 
beyond puberty, the lengthening of the lower limbs becomes 



56 Growth During School Age 

normally very feeble and that already, from the age of 
eight years, the lower limbs grow less and less each year. 

Therefore a hoy or girl from thirteen to sixteen years 
who grows noticeably only in the lower limhs is already, 
on this ground, open to suspicion to the educator who is 
forewarned. 

If it were permissible to reason thus biologically, one 
could say -that of the two sources of growth from which 
the long bone draws, dating from the period of puberty, 
the one periosteal, is the expression of nutrition, the other, 
cartilaginous, is the expression of lack of nutrition. 

That has at least the advantage of marking out clearly 
for the educator the choice which it behooves him to make 
and to fix the direction in which he must orientate his ac- 
tion. 

It is sufficient to take away from parents the ambition of 
seeing their children become larger than themselves. What 
"race" does not do, it is necessary to avoid provoking, at 
least in what concerns stature. So much the more as in- 
crease of stature under the influences which precede, is al- 
ways made to the detriment of dimensions advantageous 
for the body. 

Owing to the state of illness of the child subjected to 
these influences the phases of alternation (I shall return 
later to the biological role of alternation) are transgressed. 
While, in the regular evolution of growth, a phase of in- 
crease in bulk succeeds a phase of increase in length, it is 
no longer so in the case of the poor young prisoner of the 
urban apartment and of the establishments of instruction, 
and one of the phases is prolonged indefinitely; the worst 
is, it is fatal. 

Stature, the highest that phylogeny admits of, is real- 
ized then, saving exceptions, to the detriment of the dimen- 



Influences which Act on Growth 57 

sions of the body, the most advantageous for its strength 
and the most useful for its preservation from sickness. 

Conceive now to what errors of interpretation we should 
expose ourselves deliberately if we should judge of growth 
by height, if we should want to evaluate according to their 
effects on height, the influences which are susceptible of 
acting upon growth. 

We know now that the study of the influences of these 
diverse factors on height instructs us very little in what 
concerns the action of these factors upon growth, in spite 
of the corrective contributed by weighing, which divers au- 
thors point out. 

Logically we shall consider as very useful documents the 
studies made in this direction, but for the word "growth" 
we shall substitute mentally the word "s+ature"; we shall 
keep in mind that we do not have the right to come to a 
conclusion of the one from the other. That fact estab- 
lished, the following is a resume of the notions acquired rela- 
tive to the diff'erent influences on height. 

The influence of nutrition which is here suitably called 
alimentation, because nutrition is the resultant of a host of 
organic factors of physical, chemical, and biological order, 
which appears to depend especially "upon heredity and 
placental alimentation, and of which we are within reach 
of verifying only the eff^ects. Alimentation which repre- 
sents only one element of it, the external element, is, on the 
contrary, in our hands, an undeniable means of action and 
we ought to observe its influence with the greatest care. 
According to the writers, it appears that, all things being 
equal, and especially the conditions depending upon the 
race and family inheritance, stature becomes greater under 
the influence of a substantial alimentation. The study of 
Carlier: "Des rapports de la taille avec le bien-etre" (some 



58 Growth During School Age 

relations of stature to well-being) is one of the best of which 
we are possessed with those of Villerme (1829) and that 
of Manouvrier (1888). But these studies do not only con- 
sider the alimentary influence, they refer to all the sur- 
rounding conditions. It would also be necessary to know 
whether the stature of the descendants thus favored has 
exceeded that of the progenitors. 

Influence of sew. — ^Assuredly the average stature is less 
in the feminine sex; as to the manner of behavior of the in- 
crease of the stature throughout the successive ages, the 
writers are not in accord. Variot and Chaumet (1906) do 
not subscribe to the conclusions of Schmidt who disap- 
proves of Quetelet's viewpoint. All of that is especially a 
matter of methods of observation, Quetelet alone having ob- 
served with constancy the same children from age to age. 

Influence of race and heredity. — These two factors can 
hardly be separated as H. de Varigny ^ remarked. The 
tables cited by that author are the best proof of the kind, 
and it is necessary to abide by the tables, for everywhere 
confusion reigns between "increase of height and growth," 
whence the difficulty of squaring the proofs on man with 
those which breeders have collected on animals, who do not 
seem to fall into the same error. 

STATURE ACCORDING TO RACES 
(after H. de Varigny) 

Tall stature, 170 cm. and over, 

Patagonians, 185 cm. ; Comanches, 180 cm. ; Polynesians, 

176 cm. ; Iroquois, 173 cm. ; Scandinavians, 171 cm. ; Scotch, 

171 cm. ; Zulus, 170 cm. ; Esquimaux, 170 cm. 

' H. de Varigny. Art. Croissance du Dictionnaire de Physiologic, 
Ch. Richet.— F. Alcan, edit., 2e fasc. du t. IV. 



Influences which Act on Growth 59 

Above the average, 165 to 169 cm. 

Nubians, English, Germans, 169 cm. ; Belgians and Arabs, 
168 cm. ; French, 165 cm. 

Below the average, 160 to 16 Jf, cm. 
Australians, Chinese, Bavarians, Esthonians, 164 cm.; 
Jews, 163 cm. ; Japanese, 160 cm. 

Small, less than 160 cm, 
Malays, Annamese, 159 cm.; Ostiaks, 156 cm.; Lap- 
landers, 153 cm.; Siamese, 152 cm.; Bushmen, 144 cm. 

De Varigny does not give the sources from which he 
draws the facts of these tables. Polynesians, Arabs, Es- 
quimaux are evidently too comprehensive denominations. 
Among the Arabs I have personally verified some ethnic 
groups differing greatly, and, on the other hand, the average 
height of Esquimaux which I have been able to measure was 
147 cm. and did not attain to 150 cm. even among those of 
the young men of the Hudson Bay shores, who kept on their 
moccassins. ^They were some thirty years of age. 

Let us remember that Broca attributed the predominant 
influence, in matter of stature to race. 

Influence of climate. — De Varigny rightly makes us ob- 
serve that no conclusion can be drawn from these collected 
data because no account at all has been taken of racial 
difference, and because the method used is not good. The 
fact is that the theory of the reductive influence of cold on 
the proportions of living organisms is hardly verified for 
man who counts the tallest of his representatives in the 
frigid countries, such as Patagonia, Scandinavia or Scot- 
land, and who presents races of pigmies in Maylasia (von 
Luschan), in Congo (Poutrin), etc. 

Under the equator live some t^;l r-^en and near the poles 



60 Growth During School Age 

are found the Lapps and certain groups of very small 
Esquimaux (147 cm.). According to that, climate exer- 
cises no appreciable action on adult stature; man's tall- 
ness or shortness remains independent of latitude. 

When one gets a clear idea of it, he is convinced that cli- 
mate has no relation with the manner in which, under the 
diverse latitudes, the different parts of the body are de- 
veloped from birth ; climate has no relation with the modality 
of growth, with its rhythm. 

Influence of seasons. — The patient researches of Mailing 
Hansen, who followed day by day the height and weight of 
the deaf mutes of his institution at Copenhagen, and even 
repeated the measurement and weighing several times a day, 
furnish some very interesting ideas the import of which 
would be still greater if his subjects had not been infirm, 
subjected to institutional life, and if he had not limited 
himself to the measurement of stature and weight. 

Be that as it may. Mailing Hansen recognized that when 
weight augments, height does not appear to increase, and 
vice versa : "During autumn and beginning of winter, the 
child accumulates weight ; but height remains stationary. 
At the beginning of summer, weight remains almost with- 
out change, but the child shoots up in height, like the trees," 
etc.^ 

According to Combe (of Lausanne) season exercised its 
influence already before birth; boys born from September 
to February were shorter than the boys born from March 
to August; girls were shorter when born from December 
to May. The younger children of Daffner always showed 
a summer growth superior to winter growth (October to 
April.) 

*De Varigny, loc. cit. 



Influences which Act on Growth 61 

The researches of Carlier ^ which preceded the above and 
seem to have inspired them as they have inspired mine, had 
admirably determined the influence of the seasons relative 
to weight, to thoracic perimeter and to height which the 
author sums up in the following table. 

Average total increase in summer and in winter of the 
perimeter (subpectoral thoracic girth), of weight and of 
height. 



(From 131/2 to 15i/o years) 

■ ■ - 4.7 cm. 

I summer 8.9 cm. 



Perimeter \ ^^^^ • " !'! ^^-l Difference 4.2 cm. 



W^^^^* ^ —••'•••• *•' '.'mkli difference 1.778 kg. 
^^'^^* 1 rummer. .' .' ." .' ] .' .' ." 7.7 cS.' \ ^^iff^rence 1.2 cm. 

However, as Buifon had already remarked, between birth 
and five years, the seasons are without influence on increase 
of height. Beyond five years the influence becomes very evi- 
dent. 

The influence of gestation, — There is no antagonism at 
all, as Herbert Spencer thought between these two evolu- 
tions : growth and reproduction. Every physician has met 
young mothers who kept on growing between the birth and 
the weaning of their first-born and even later. Nubility, 
however, we shall see, is really established only with the com- 
pletion of the growth of the diff'erent parts of the body, and 
consequently of height. 

The influence of castration will be discussed in the study 
of the influence of the reproductive function. 

Reciprocal relation of illness and growth. — There re- 
mains for us to get a brief notion, of the influence of illness 

^Dr.G. Carlier, physician major of the army, Extract des Memoires 
ae la bociete d'Anthropologie de Paris, 2e serie, t. IV, 82 pages. "Re- 
cherches anthropometriques sur la croissance." 



62 Growth During ScJiool Age 

on the increase of stature ; and of growth on illness or, more 
exactly of age on illness. 

We have already seen above that after a general fashion, 
illness increases height particularly during the period of 
convalescence. From "preliminary reservation," it cannot 
be a question in these cases of explaining the source on 
which the organic effort of growth draws ; no more than 
of gathering up ("recueillement") for the organism has 
just undergone a particularly exhausting test while meet- 
ing the obligations which an infection necessarily brings 
along with it. 

As to the phases of growth to which the organism be- 
comes more vulnerable, there is none of them which may 
not be the fact of a fault in bringing up or education, per- 
haps in both, unless both have been preceded by the action 
of an unlucky heredity. 

Placental alimentation has its repercussion up to the time 
of puberty. The feeding of the nursling makes a good or 
bad digestive apparatus, which becomes from that point a 
gateway closed or open to the various infections to which 
infancy is exposed. Now, as Marfan has demonstrated, the 
most of the infections of young age penetrate into the or- 
ganism by way of the digestive tract. 

I have been able to determine that it is also the digestive 
tract which gives access to the greatest number of infec- 
tions, in the child, up to the end of the pubescent phase. 
So that the receptivity of a child to disease during the 
course of its growth, is in great part the work of the 
mother who has been a good or bad placental nurse, a good 
or bad nurse at the breast, or who replaced the breast with 
the bottle, creating with the greatest ease that "latent dis- 
pepsia" which Marfan describes and incurring the respon- 
sibility of later infections. 



Influences whicH Act on Growth 63 

Thus everything leads back, in matter of relation he- 
tween growth and sickness, to individual conditions. 

Influence of exercise. — Carlier recognizes, as the authors 
who have preceded and followed him, withal, that height 
does not appear to be influenced by physical exercises. How- 
ever, permanent living in the open air, continued erect pos- 
ture, long daily walks, hard work, do not favor in the child 
development in height but in breadth, in thickness, in bulk, 
that is in strength. In the city, this fact is observed in 
the young workmen who wait on masons, for example. 

Animals which are deprived of exercise by keeping them 
sheltered from the light, as I have repeatedly experimented 
on animals not subjected to the regime of fattening, do not 
delay in stretching out and surpass in a relatively short 
time the height of subjects of the same age and more. For 
rabbits and for chickens, nothing is more easy to verify. 

During eight years, I followed some methodical investi- 
gations concerning the influence of gymnastic exercises on 
the growth of the diff*erent dimensions of the child. I did 
not stop with his stature, his girth, and his weight; I took 
other measurements. The following are the conclusions to 
which I have been led in what concerns these three measure- 
ments : 

In adolescents from fourteen and one-half to eighteen 
years old, gymnastics on apparatus (stationary bar) : 

1. Does not injure growth in height. 

S. Procures for the thoracic cavity more amplitude than 
it would take on spontaneously. 

3. Increases the density of the tissues, the weight of the 
body, etc. 

The import of these conclusions is due to the method pur- 
sued, to the number of scholars observed, two hundred, to the 
continuity of the observation on the same children from 



64 Growth During School Age 

semester to semester, etc., all conditions usual to the 
auxanological method, which I conceived and have continu- 
ously applied since 1891-1893. 

The grouping of pupils into gymnasts, non-gymnasts, 
sickly gymnasts and sickly non-gymnasts has permitted of 
studying the diverse categories of scholars in function of 
gymnastic exercises and of always reserving a number of 
children for proof (temoins) equal to the number of chil- 
dren observed in order to permit valid comparisons. 

The influence of exercises was investigated in its effects 
on growth. It was advisable then to make the starting point 
very clear-cut between the development due to the spon- 
taneous evolution of growth and the development due to 
exercise.^ For that purpose, it was necessary that the 
study of growth precede that of the modifier, the agent of 
physical education. This is what was done. 

Finally, I took account of distant effects, of remote re- 
sults of the exercises on growth, while continuing to observe 
the pupils beyond the period of gymnastic training. 

These advantageous conditions of observation were found 
realized then for the first time. They have not been repeated 
since. Also, I believe I ought to lay stress upon it in order 
to cause you to note the complexity of the experimentation 
when it has for its object growth, for subjects children, 
that is, organisms in process of continuous transformation, 
as much as to make you note especially the results which 
differ in certain aspects from the results mentioned above, 
by the preceding and following authors. My memoir was 
published in 1901 by the Anthropological Society of Paris. 

These researches have had at the same time as end the 

' An indispensable method in order to. arrive at a classification of 
exercises according to their effects. 



Influences which Act on Growth 65 

establishing of a method of checking up of the effects of 
physical education by anthropometric means. 

For this reason they represent an application to educa- 
tion of the auxanological method and will be stated with 
their graphs and tables in the part of this work which treats 
more specially of applications to education and pedagogy, 
of the results of my researches on Growth of the different 
parts of the body. 

The influence of consanguinity on growth is poorly under- 
stood in man and besides difficult to study, the terms of 
comparison being lacking. In animals, observation assumes 
the precision of an experimentation. It is stated that con- 
sanguinity represents only a hereditary accumulation in 
the same direction, as far as the notions acquired at pres- 
ent are able to give an account of it (v. Mendel's laws). 

Influence of function of reproduction is considerable. — It 
is of the greatest importance for the educator to be ac- 
quainted with it. It will be treated in Chapters V, VI, VII, 
and VIII. It is puberty. 



CHAPTER V 

PUBERTY INFLUENCE OF THE REPRODUCTIVE ELEMENTS 

ON GROWTH 

Determination of the dawn of puberty. — Some causes of 
error. — Most favorable season for the dawn of puberty. 
— Almost the whole of puberal phenomena escapes him 
who does not repeat semiannually his observations on 
the same subject. — What is puberty? Definition. 

IF we desire to study the influence of the function of re- 
production on growth we must approach it by that one 
of its manifestations which is the most easily seized upon. 

We shall see next if we are able to reach in each direction, 
to the age which precedes and to the age which follows, and 
to search into and understand the action of the constant 
element of the evolution of reproduction, of the germen, not 
only on one dimension of the body but on all the dimensions 
of the organism of the child, considered in its totality and in 
each of its parts, just as in the proportional relations of 
these parts among themselves. It is, in a word, the action of 
the germen on growth which we shall attempt to determine, 
abandoning the beaten paths and the simple verification of 
coincidences. 

The importance of this study for the educator is further 
increased by this fact that growth reveals some of the ob- 
scure phases of the evolution of the germen' Reciprocally 
the germen makes us understand certain parts of the mechan- 

66 



II 



Puberty 67 

ism of growth by the mode of influence which it exercises 
upon it. 

• •••••• 

Puberty is announced in both sexes, just as its name in- 
dicates (pubes, hair) by the shoot of hairs on the skin which 
covers the anterior part of the bones of the basin called 
pubis. Hair shows itself first at this point, then, a little 
later in the armpits when the hairs of the pubis are already 
quite developed. 

In woman, the appearance of the menstrual flow precedes 
by very little that of the axillary hairs according to Dr. 
Martha Francillon, and determines the period of the dawn 
of puberty. The flow gradually increases in abundance 
and reaches its fulness in the girl in good health at the 
same time that the growth of the hair of the armpits and 
pubis is completed. 

In man the essential phenomenon escaping investigation, 
the secondary signs assume greater importance, and it be- 
comes indispensable to arrange them in order of importance 
for the purpose of obtaining exact information. 

Determination of the dawn of puberty in boys, — ^Let us 
note by P^, the appearance of the first hairs on the pubis, 
other than the downy hair, besides hardly visible^ and which 
fall at the invasion of the real hair. The boy has an aver- 
age age of fourteen and one-half years. 

At the following half yearly measurement, which is at the 
age of fifteen years, the hairs have become more numerous 
and the voice has taken on a degree of hoarseness which it 
did not have before. You note down P^ and the change of 
voice, summer or winter 191 — . 

The following semester, the subject reaches fifteen and 
one-half years ; the hairs have become still more numerous 



68 Growth During School Age 

on the pubis, longer, and form a light fleece, but sufficient to 
conceal the skin of the region. You record P^. But, at 
the same time the attention of the observer being at each 
examination methodically directed to the whole cutaneous 
surface, he discovers in one or both of the armpits a light 
down of analogous color or a trifle lighter than that of 
the down on the pubis. You mark A^. 

At this time, fifteen and one-half years, there is then 
on the appearance of puberty the following data: P^ A^, 
change of voice, 15% years. 

Does the color of the scrotum change.^ Different authors 
mention a scrotal pigmentation. If the color of the scrotum 
is modified, it is very little. It is frequently a matter of an 
appearance due to the wrinkling of the skin by a stronger 
and more sensitive dartos, the subject being deprived of 
clothing. To the darkened grooves which result from it, 
is added a sombre tint which the few hairs more or less 
dark, disseminated over its surface, give to the teguments. 
That is far from taking place in all cases. If this sign were 
constant, I should propose to note the reenforcement of the 
dartos, a flat muscle whose contraction produces the cu- 
taneous puckering by the same mechanism as on the fore- 
head, for example. 

The volume of the genital organs is modified only in 
exceptions at this epoch. Their augmentation has been 
verified in the whole of my series of the first and second rank 
only in the neighborhood of seventeen years. Consequently 
this modification does not occur at an opportune time to help 
the researches of the observer who purposes limiting him- 
self scrupulously to the notation of statements which are 
certain. 

Physicians would have definitely established all those 
facts long ago, if they had been called to observe periodi- 



Fuherty 69 

cally, the same subjects in a nude state. But in the lycees, 
colleges, or schools, as well as in the families, the physician 
is called only to the bedside of the sick child, and, on the 
other hand, in the consultation of an educational institu- 
tion, as in that of the hospital, he has an opportunity of 
observing in its ensemble the nude body of the adolescent 
only if the latter is afflicted by an affection which makes 
necessary a complete stripping, which is the exception. Be- 
sides, his observation would have worth only if it were re- 
peated in the following half-year intervals. 

The grouping of these three signs, P^, A^, change of voice, 
appears sufficient to establish the time at which puberty is 
settled. It is to be remarked that the change of voice has 
coincided in general with P^, and was able to be recorded 
at the corresponding measurement at the average age of 
fifteen years. It precedes by about six months the time at 
which one can record P^ A^, 

In order to obtain all the desired precision and to give 
to each sign the importance which it merits, it is necessary 
to be acquainted with the chronology of these phenomena, 
the average age of the appearance of each one of them. 
For change of voice the average age is fourteen years and 
eight months, while P attains the third power, and A the 
first, at the age of fifteen years and six months. We shall 
see that the change of voice is often difficult to observe, and 
that in the great majority of cases it is expedient to con- 
sider the dawn of puberty as answering to P^ A^, that is, 
for the average, at the age of fifteen years and six months. 
I remind you by reason of its singularity and of the 
functional and pathological correlations which you can 
verify, of a fact which I mentioned already in 1902, namely, 
the appearance of hair later in the left armpit than in the 
right or the reverse. That is met with only in some cases. 



70 



Growth During School Age 



In all cases, on the contrary, I have observed the delay of 
the axillary shoot on the pubic shoot, a delay of a year on 
the average, as the difference of powers of P and of A in 
the expression P^ A^ indicates clearly. 

It is conceived that this order of chronological hierarchy 
of the facts of growth can be observed only on condition 
of following the same subjects from half-year to half-year. 
Some causes of error. — It may happen that the downy 
hairs are mistaken for a beginning of the puberal shoot; 
the fact is rather rare but it can occur. Here is an ex- 
ample: number thirteen of my series of the first rank (100 
subjects from thirteen to eighteen years)' entered the pre- 
paratory school at thirteen years and four months, present- 
ing on the face and temples, on the back, on the posterior 
side of the arm, on the anterior part of the legs, some 
downy hairs in abundance, lying flat, and of a brown color. 
In April, 1897, I ascertained on the pubic region, some 
fine hairs quite abundant. I noted PV2' ^^ October of the 
same year, the disappearance was quite noticeable and I 
was obliged to lower the power of P to 14. In the month 
of April following, April, 1898, the pubis had regained its 
fine down of 1897 and merited again ?%• When the meas- 
urement of October, 1898, took place, the pubic region was 
wholly smooth and gave place to the notation P^. The same 
condition existed in April, 1899. Finall}^, in October, 1899, 
some hairs no longer down, but downright black, stronger 
and more abundant, covered the pubis in part, and were 
equal to P^. Then there succeeded on the record card of the 
individual from semester to semester: P^ A'^ ; P^ A^; P^ A^ ; 
it was a matter of a subject measured ten times, the great 
majority of his comrades in the same school having been 
measured only nine times, that is, at nine consecutive se- 
mesters. 



Puberty 71 

In the matter of the change of the voice, I have only a 
Eew remarks to add. It is clear that it is not sufficient to 
note one time in passing, in traversing an agglomeration 
as physician or explorer, that the voice of a boy or girl is 
dissonant, hoarse or low to conclude there is a change of the 
larynx. 

The change is, when it is produced, always the same 
phenomenon arising in the course of adolescence with the 
same characteristics, with the same sequence of signs. But 
it can very well not have occurred or pass unperceived. The 
state of the voice during change, aside from some remark- 
able cases, is only a modification of the anterior state ; ac- 
quaintance with this anterior state, with the sonorousness 
and with the timbre customary in the voice of the child, 
will permit the estimating of the changes in him, in propor- 
tion as they occur. There also, the indispensable condition 
of a good observation is to follow the same subject through- 
out the years of adolescence. 

There are children, for whom the observer experiences 
some difficulty in assigning a date to this phenomenon, in 
appearance so striking, of the change of the voice. In such 
, adolescent, the modification is made in a manner quite in- 
sensible to the best trained ear. That appears to arise from 
the fact that the voice is modified at once in the whole range 
of its scale as is often observed in girls. Hence, the absence 
of discordant sounds and of hoarseness ; the tone becomes 
deeper by a slow and gentle progress, so that the change 
can occur unperceived by the most attentive observer. 

I have met in schools some children with a deep voice 
upon their arrival, when they did not yet present any sign 
of puberty. Whether it be a matter of a premature change 
or of a special individual conformation, the result is never- 
theless that it is almost impossible to determine for that 



72 Growth During School Age 

class of subjects the time at which this sign of puberty 
really appears. 

In numbers 10 and 17 of the series of the first rank 
(100 children, thirteen to eighteen years) the change of the 
voice was unnoticeable ; it was completed without my suc- 
ceeding in fixing the date of it. The other attributes of 
puberty manifested themselves between fifteen and sixteen 
years as for the greatest number. The "bass" voice gave 
rise to the same results for numbers, 6, 25, and 39 of this 
same series. 

In 100 boys, 70 changes can be determined; 5 can not be 
determined; and in 25 there is no change. The other sec- 
ondary signs occur at greatly variable periods of the evo- 
lution of puberty, so that they cannot be systematically 
used when it is a question of determining the time of ap- 
pearance of puberty, 

• •••••• 

Most favorable season for the dawn of puberty. — The 
warm season is more favorable than the cold to the dawn 
of puberty in the adolescent. Out of 100 subjects, there 
are 12 for which the appearance of puberty could not be 
determined, either because it had already taken place at 
the time of admission to school or because it had not mani- 
fested itself before the last measurement. 

SEASON OF APPEARANCE OF PUBERTY 

Number of observations 100 

Warm season 53 

Cold season 35 

Indeterminate 12 

Almost the whole of puberal phenomena escapes him who 
does not repeat semi-annually his observations on the same 
subject. — It is not enough to examine the child once a year, 
if it is desired to discern the season of the appearance of 



Puberty 73 

puberty. Semi-annual observation is indispensable as well 
for the determination of pilar signs as for the determination 
of the progress of puberty. For want of the periodical ex- 
amination of the same subject, phenomena of all kinds also 
escape, and nothing can be known of what has immediately 
preceded or immediately followed the dawn of puberty. 

The year, in respect of its temperature, not being divisi- 
ble into less than two periods, the warm season and the 
cold, and the half-yearly measurement, April-October, for 
example, taking account of it, it follows that the modifica- 
tions marked in October, are changes realized during the 
warm period, changes with respect to the results of the 
measurements and notations of April preceding. 

An annual observer would not have seen his subjects again 
from October to October; the changes noted by him would 
be only by comparison with the results of the preceding 
year; the phases of evolution effected in the course of the 
cold season would remain unknown. For the annual ob- 
server, the term "prepubescent" designates the subject dur- 
ing the "year" previous, while for the semi-annual observer 
the same term is applied to the state which has immediately 
preceded that to which the present measurement is applied. 
The difference is considerable. Not merely by reason of the 
divergence which that engenders, but especially in the in- 
terest of reality. Let us recognize, however, that the quali- 
fying term prepuhescent can, with as much reason be at- 
tributed to the whole period of growth which stretches 
between birth and puberty. 

What is puberty? Definition. — ^And now, since the con- 
ditions of its appearance are well determined, let us ask 
what puberty is. 

The comparative study of the half-yearly observations of 
my two series of peripubescents (230 subjects from thirteen 



74 Growth During School Age 

to eighteen years, the same followed at six-month intervals) 
constitutes the basis upon which the notions rest which have 
just been developed touching the phenomena of puberty 
and the correlative phenomena which interest the direction 
of education of the child. 

The deductions of this comparative study can be very 
numerous as soon as puberty is considered in its origins, its 
mechanism, in its effects as it is here. But it is essential 
that each of the deductions proceed exactly from the facts 
observed, that each induction rest on these facts through- 
out the whole extent of its base. 

Up to this point, puberty was especially considered as a 
phase more or less difficult to traverse, and beyond which, 
the child, become a young man, found himself in a state to 
procreate. Physiology qualified it by "the period charac- 
terized by profound sexual modifications." (Gley). The 
special recent studies designate it as the "post-embryonic 
period specially consecrated to the establishment of the 
genital function representing the human homologue of the 
sexual maturity of animals."^ Dr. Cruchet in his article 
"Puberty" of the "Practique des Maladies des Enfants" 
presses the analysis of puberty farther than most authors. 
"In resume," he writes in 1909, "we shall designate under 
the name puberty the whole period of growth which extends 
from twelve to fifteen years in girls and from fourteen to 
eighteen years in boys. It includes the series of modifica- 
tions of physical or psychical order which have for effect 
the transforming of the organism of the child into a new 
organism, that of the adolescent." 

I do not believe that we ought to content ourselves with 
coincidences which, in the main, these diverse essays at defi- 
nition limit themselves to establish. That cannot suffice us 
* "La Puberty," 1906, by Dr. Martha Francillon. 



Puberty 75 

as physicians, as educators. It is necessary for us to at- 
tempt to go farther, to make use of the latest acquisitions 
of science in order to go back to the causes. 

If we should succeed in this line, we should certainly bring 
some light into the knowledge of the nature and role of 
puberty; into the knowledge of the relations of the germen 
and of the soma. I propose then to pass immediately to the 
final synthesis and to define puberty according to its cause, 
its character and its action. 



Definition of puberty 

Puberty is that phase of growth in which the matured 
germen provokes a new embryonic elaboration of the soma 
in order to mature it in its turn, and to perfect thus the 
function of reproduction. 

This definition, if it is in accord with reality, ought to 
enable us to understand the phenomena of puberty, not 
only in general, but also in each individual in particular; 
it ought also to put us on the scent of the explanation of 
a good many of the phenomena. 

Understood, and partially explained, puberty ceasing to 
be an enigma for the educator, it depends upon him to make 
it a point of support and to find in it a bit of illumination, 
in the difficult hours of the direction of education of the 
individual, as well as the indispensable physiological basis of 
a psychological puberty adequate to reality^ 

While waiting, we are going to attempt our best to 
scrutinize the profound nature of this phenomenon and we 
"shall not turn aside from any detail into which its analysis 
will lead us. 



CHAPTER VI 

PUBERTY (continued) 

Anally sis of puberty by the means of the 'phenomena of 
growth which it determines. — Augmented growth, re- 
duced or arrested growth, total growth or appearance 
of organs, disappearance of organs, involutions, — 
Embryogenic function of puberty, 

ANALYSIS of puberty by means of the phenomena of 
growth which it determines, — When the time of puberty 
approaches, growth modifies its rhythm in the divers seg- 
ments. Plates I, II, III, IV, V, IX, X and XVI. The 
activity of increase is greater for some tissue, less for some 
other, none at all or retrogressive elsewhere. Certain organs 
appear at all points. 

Augmented growth. — The child on becoming pubescent 
loses many of the elements which give elasticity to his move- 
ments ; the elastic fibers lose elasticity, and there are some 
fibrous elements whose multiplication enlarges the ligaments 
and the tendons, and thickens the aponeuroses! 

The connective tissue of which the fibrous elements are 
constituted also form numerous other organs, even some 
cellules with the function of secretion. It constitutes the 
balustrades, the partitions, the systems of support of the 
viscera. It forms the meninges (duramater and piamater), 
it forms the serous membranes, those of articulation as 
those of the great cavities, the arachnoid which clothes 

76 



Puberty 77 

the brain, as the pleura which covers the lungs and the 
peritoneum of the intestines. The connective tissue under 
its divers aspects is the seat of augmentation of breadth and 
thickness, of appreciable physiological hypertrophy. 

The long bones have, above all, elongated since birth, the' 
connective cartilage enjoying superior activity which char- 
acterizes cartilaginous growth during this period. From 
now on, they are to grow stouter ;-'^ this increase in thick- 
ness will be due to the osteogenetic activity of the perios- 
teum which, in its character of original connective tissue, has 
benefited by the general connective hypertrophy, and has 
received in abundance of the formative elements of which 
it was moderately provided up to this time. 

The muscles of the limbs, of the trunk, of the neck, of 
the face, and of the skull, augment in the semester of the 
appearance of puberty more than they had augmented in 
the semester preceding. The striated muscles of the heart 
take on, by successive steps, greater thickness, and the en- 
tire organ greater volume. Frequent, periodic ausculation 
reveals in many children the alternation of this increase 
which is in correlation, moreover, with the increase of blood 
pressure. The diaphragm gains in strength by the hy- 
pertrophy of its double muscular and connective element as 
the accrued amplification of the abdominal respiratory move- 
ments prove. The smooth muscles of the walls of the blood- 
vessels are notably strengthened as are those of the walls 
of the digestive tube, and particularly those of the intes- 
tines. 

The external genital organs show only very little change 

at the debut of puberty. The authors who describe the 

notable development of these organs and complete it by a 

series of attributes which directly make adult organs of 

* This development is delayed for the tibia and the fibula Plate X, D. 



78 Growth During School Age 

them quite certainly have not been able to determine the 
period of puberty which they were observing. 

This determination is, in fact, we know, quite impossible 
when the identical children are not examined at intervals 
of six months. For him who, on the contrary, proceeds in 
this fashion, puberty shows itself much less in haste to trans- 
form the external genital organs; it takes a year for it, 
often more and at least six months. 

The testicles, in absence of volume, takfe on immediately 
a little more firmness. It is probable that the prostate. 
Cooper's glands and the seminal vesicles will grow in pro- 
portion to the requirements which the activity of the func- 
tion of reproduction will impose upon them. But exactly 
in consequence of the functional correlations which con- 
nect them, it is logical to expect this hypertrophy of the 
sexual glands only at the time when the genital organs them- 
selves give evidence of a sufficient functional maturity. 

Reduced or arrested growth. — The skin is in this state; 
its epidermal layer is renewed in thickness, but it augments 
only feebly and slowly in extent. In observing the same 
non-pubescent subject semi-annually, one remarks, on some 
prescribed points around the articulation of the knee, for 
example, that the tegument is relaxed, easy to pinch be- 
tween the fingers and to raise within a certain limit. At 
the following examination, when the augmentation of weight 
corresponds to a normal increase, without addition of adi- 
pose tissue, at the same spot the skin is seen to be stretched, 
more or less difficult to pinch, but quite removed in any 
event from the looseness noted in the preceding semester. 
This is an effect of alternation in the growth of the skin. 

When, in this subject, the time of dawn of puberty comes, 
it occurs that the tension of the skin, and the condition is 
more obvious above the knees than elsewhere, is still more 



Puberty 79 

increased. It is, without doubt, that the lower limbs are 
enormously and suddenly elongated; that can proceed to 
the point of rupture of the elastic elements (Troisier and 
Menetrier) of the skin, a rupture which takes place fol- 
lowing one or several transversal lines above the knee-pan, 
and leaves behind one or several white bands called "ver- 
getures de croissance." ^ 

There is the same reduction of development for the ner- 
vous tissue whose noble element approaches, at the time 
of puberty, the limit of its increase while the connective 
element, which surrounds and penetrates it, benefits more 
or less by the general connective hypertrophy. 

The brain, according to the tables of Vierordt and of 
Boyd, attains its greatest average weight between fifteen 
and sixteen years. Vierordt ^ finds at twenty-one years 
(average adult age of those who reached puberty at the 
average age of fifteen and one-half years) that the average 
weight of the brain does not exceed 1412 grams, while it 
reaches 1490 grams at fifteen years in the male. In the 
female, the same author finds the maximum 1345 grams at 
fourteen years and only 1228 grams at twenty years. 

The statistics of Boyd (1861) cited by Manouvrier in 
his article "Morphologie generale du cerveau" of the Die- 
tionnaire de physiologie by Charles Richet, gives: from 
twenty to thirty years, 1357 grams, and from fourteen to 
twenty years, 1374 grams in man. For adult woman he 
gives 1238 grams, while the girl from fifteen to twenty 
years reaches 1244 grams (brain weight). 

From these two sets of statistics it evidently follows 
that the maximum weight of the brain is attained at the 
moment of puberty. The tables of Vierordt are still more 

^Rays arising from the distension of the skin in growth. — Trl. 
^"Daten und Tabellen." 



80 Growth During School Age 

categoric than those of Boyd because they fix the age and 
show better the decline of the weight of the brain beyond 
puberty. Postpubescent reduction of increase of nervous 
tissue affects the peripheral nerves like the central nerves. 

Total growth. Appearance of organs. — The hairs of the 
pubis and of the arm-pits spring up at all points. Their 
emergence, at the surface of the skin of these two pre- 
scribed regions, and that in both sexes, caused it to be used 
as a sign of the approach, then of the dawn of puberty. 

The first hairs which range over the surface of the body 
are downy hairs, hairs lacking in marrow and supplied 
with large sebaceous glands. At a given time, these hairs 
fall, and the shoots of the permanent ones begin, the latter 
with pith, hairs of the same sort as those which will later 
appear on the face. 

Thinly-scattered at first, they merit the notation P^, 
then successively F^ and P^, on the pubis where they are 
first seen. We know that it is at this moment that the hairs 
of the arm-pits appear, A^, while the change of voice, another 
phenomenon of growth, was realized when P had reached 
P^. We have also seen that the hair does not always appear 
at the same time in both arm-pits, a difference which will 
always be noted by reason of its possible correlation with 
the state of the lung corresponding to the retarded arm- 
pit. I have met a few cases of pulmonary tuberculosis 
in boys who had presented this phenomenon, the tubercular 
lung corresponding first to the tardy shoot. 



Another example of total growth is given by the thyroid 
gland, where are organized, around vessels, a veritable net- 
work of lymphatic vessels which are substituted for the blood 
vessels in their role of channels of excretion of colloidal 



Puberty 81 

substance. This fact, whose physiological interpretation 
remains quite obscure, is construed by a new activity of the 
thyroidal function and by various organic phenomena which 
appear to be attached to it. 

This suffices in order that the educator may remember 
that the thyroid gland enters into a new phase of its organic 
role, dating from the dawn of puberty, and that he will 
do well to follow its variations in volume, with a view to 
pointing them out to the physician, if such should be the 
case. 

Disappearance of organs. Involutions, — It is one thing 
to consider some phenomena of this order as some coinci- 
dences with those which precede and with puberty itself, 
another thing to join them to a common cause and to show 
that the objective, is indeed always, although indirectly, 
the convergence of all the organic resources towards the 
realization of the function of reproduction. 

The evolution of the thymus is a witness of this in an 
interesting fashion. Observation on animals has demon- 
strated to me, in fact, that the volume of the thymus and 
that of the testicle are inversely proportional during the 
immature phase, and the same condition holds in man before 
puberty, as I have been able to verify in subjects whose^ 
thymus possessed a cervical lobe appreciable to the touch. 

That gives meaning to the retrogression of the thymus 
and explains in a certain measure the role of the lympho- 
epithelial body, its relation with chondroblastic activity, 
with the richness in myeloplax of the marrow of the bones ; 
and it is explained somewhat that the thymus recedes at the 
moment when the dawn of the function of the testicle is ef- 
fected, at which time the character and influence of the 
interstitial cellules are recognized, at the moment when 
there is produced in the thyroid gland, a transformation 



8S Growth During School Age 

incontestably favorable to the role which it appears called 
upon to play henceforth. 

The thymus is vascularized before the third month 
(Prenant). It enters into function from this time. The 
beginning of its retrogression has been fixed at the age of 
two years. That is individual. But, in general, its volume 
diminishes and the fatty degeneration of certain of its ele- 
ments is effected in proportion as the volume and firmness 
of the testicle increase, in order to perfect itself about the 
time at which the germen terminates its evolution. 

The group of lymphoid organs called amygdalae, "en- 
closed follicles," undergoes a similar regression although 
slower, and not appearing to depend to the same degree 
on the development of the testicle, but perhaps, rather on 
that of the paraganglion. Certain facts of observation lead 
me to believe as much. 

In these amygdalae, spread to every portion of the di- 
gestive tract, but which appear more voluminous at the 
level of the superior portion of the pharynx, the stifling is 
designed by the interfollicular connective tissue which be- 
comes more and more fibrous, by the closed follicles which 
they enclose, and where, from then on, fatty degeneration 
begins. 

Emhryogenic function of puberty. — By these phenom- 
ena of total growth, of augmented growth, puberty causes 
an embryogenic power to be manifested. 

Not included in puberty, is a phenomenon of appearance 
of organs, that of the coming of the teeth, which would ap- 
pear to prove that the embryogenic power, in the course 
of post-foetal ontogeny, is not the peculiar property of 
puberty. 

This would, however, be a false interpretation of the de- 
velopment of the teeth, which is a continuous phenomenon 



Puberty 83 

from the second month of interuterine life, up to the adult 
age, but of which we judge only at the time when the 
mucous membrane of the gums is cut, 

A very remarkable thing, the dental evolution presents 
three phases like the evolution of the variations presented 
by the proportions of length and breadth of the body, and 
the three phases of those two developments blend absolutely. 
In other words, the phases of dental evolution are added to 
the phases of the evolution of the proportions in order to 
characterize the periods, the ages of evolution, such as we 
have delimited them (see p. 50). 

The first phase: from birth to six years and first denti- 
tion ; 

The second phase : from six or seven years to fifteen years 
and second dentition ; 

The third phase : from fifteen years to adult age and close 
of dentition ; that is, the four second molars and the four 
third when these latter, which are called "wisdom teeth," do 
not remain imprisoned in their alveolar processes. 

Dental evolution is then indeed a reflection of the general 
evolution of the soma (Professor Baumel) with which it 
shares the progress of growth, conformable to the laws laid 
down by Magitot.^ The period of puberty answers to its 
last phase, as for the soma, and it is to that to which its 
action is limited. 

But it is another category of phenomena which are really 
an eifect and a proof of the embryogenic character of the 
influence of puberty. I mean the irregular growth, which 
results from the diff^erent nature of the tissues which enter 
into the constitution of an organ and the difl*erent activity 
of growth of which they are the seat. In other words, in a 
like organ, the play of augmented growths, of reduced 
* "Diet, encyclopedique des Sciences medicales," Ire serie, tome XXVII. 



84! Growth During School Age 

growths and of arrested growths, creates some inequalities 
of the kind of those which have been observed in the first 
hours of life. 

In the embryo, these irregularities of growth had for end 
the building of organs. Today, since the organs are formed 
the end of irregular growth can only be to perfect them, 
to render their function easier and more in harmony with 
the new needs of the henceforth pubescent human being. 

In the whole normal organism, irregular growth is gov- 
erned in puberty by the law of alternation. When the or- 
ganic equilibrium is disturbed irregular growth can escape 
the law of alternation and determine the pathologic con- 
dition. 



CHAPTER VII 

PUBERTY (continued) 

Influence of alimentation hy the placenta; precocious pu- 
berty, delayed puberty. — Some somatic conditions of 
psychological puberty — an example. — Separation of 
pubescents from non-pubescent s. 

INFLUENCE of alimentation by the placenta. — The pla- 
centa transmits to the child some elements of nutrition 
modified, without doubt, by the special work which the mate- 
rial blood undergoes in that organ but not endowed by what 
is absent in it. Let the mother, anaemic, pale and feeble, a 
townswoman nervously engaged in the cycle of city occupa- 
tions, deprived besides of all the conditions of space, air, light, 
and physical activity which cause life to thrill to the very 
finger-tips and to the roots of the hair; let the mother, in 
short, without being positively ill, be the opposite of a vig- 
orous woman, then, placental nutrition of the child will have 
all the chances of being bad. It is the same, moreover, in 
the case where a woman well built and of usual fine health 
commits imprudence on imprudence from conception on; in 
the case where, during the course of pregnancy, pleasures 
and sports occupy her life; wedding tour, mountain trips, 
skiing, motorcars, rough voyages, etc, . . , An infectious 
malady of the mother during the evolution of the embryo- 
foetus has very often the same effects ; the latter can, be- 
sides, be very easily provoked by a simple fall in the course 
of pregnancy. Bad nutrition by the placenta can have a 

85 



86 Growth During School Age 

great many mediate and immediate effects and can be sin- 
gularly reenforced by the nature of the alimentation after 
birth. 

Precocious puberty; delayed puberty, — But a remote ef- 
fect is what one could almost count upon. This is the re- 
tardation of puberty. There is nothing about it which 
ought to surprise us. Do we not know that this embryo- 
foetal period is that of the constituting of the seminal and 
somatic progeny, that, on their nutrition at this moment de- 
pends the speed of their evolution, and that, from the con- 
stitution of the placenta, the germen finds itself under the 
nutritive dependence of the soma? That suffices in order 
to understand that a poor placental nutrition can deter- 
mine a delayed puberty, and that precocious puberty may 
be the result of a good inter-uterine alimentation. 

One rarely finds two brothers who reach their puberty 
at the same age. That fact has not at all passed unper- 
ceived by the physician who has been enabled to witness the 
birth and follow, until beyond puberty, the two male prod- 
ucts of a twin-pregnancy. 

I do not except the twins called "identical," for that 
identity does not resist the physiological and clinical ob- 
servation completed by anthropometrical examination by 
which the anatomical conditions are determined. I do not 
except them for these differences which one has a tendency 
to consider as reserved to some twins of different sexes, in 
matter of physical extra-genital quality, as in matter of 
proportions of the diverse segments of the body, exist quite 
as well, with some very rare exceptions, in twins of the same 
sex called identical. 

The cases of twin brothers, becoming pubescent at dif- 
ferent ages and having been reared under the same roof, 
are sufficiently numerous to lessen notably the influence at- 



Fuherty 87 

tributed to race, to heredity, to climate oh the advance or 
retardation of the time of puberty. Garn. Adr. reached 
puberty at 14 years; Garn. Eug., his twin brother, reached 
his at 17 years. Among boys whom I have followed like 
these from the age of thirteen years to the age of eighteen 
years, I could cite some other examples and I have equally 
noted some in families. 

Cases of brothers, not twins, but of the same father and 
mother, who have grown up side by side and have received 
the same alimentation during the first year of their exist- 
ence, testify in the same direction. 

Now, of two twins, that one who will be developed the 
last, is precisely the one who, at birth, was the least nour- 
ished. This defective inter-uterine nutrition re-echoes, we 
know, on puberty in a twofold way. The germen has been 
indifferently nourished at the very period of the constitut- 
ing of the seminal offspring and this is the chief point. Be- 
sides, the somatic offspring, at the moment of its constitu- 
tion, has suffered also from that defective nutrition of which 
the nutritive contributions of the soma to the cellules of 
Sertolli will not cease to feel the effects. That indirect in- 
fluence will be added, for the seminal offspring, to the in- 
fluence which is directly exercised upon it, and the neces- 
sary consequence is the retardation of its maturing. 

Such are the various physiological reasons which lead 
to attributing to placental alimentation the preponderate 
influence on the age of the appearance of puberty. 

Some influences, of pathological order, extra as well as 
inter-uterine, are also sometimes exercised, and show them- 
selves capable at various times of reenforcing or lessen- 
ing that primordial cause: such is the influence of a tumor 
of the testicle which can provoke, as early as the age of 
hine and one-half years, puberty with its physical and moral 



88 Growth During School Age 

attributes, puberty which disappears with the tumor and 
leaves no trace four months after removal of the latter with 
the testicle affected. All hair from the pubis and arm- 
pits have fallen and the voice itself has again become a 
child's voice (case of Dr. Sacchi, reported by Marro). 

This fact shows clearly that the germen is cause of the 
determination of puberty. It also shows the embryonic 
character of the phenomena of puberty provoked by the 
germen. 

Among the troubles due to the presence of the tumor and 
its development, a notable nutritive superactivity neces- 
sarily figured. It may be that this was the gain of that 
local superactivity which had procured to the germen the 
precocious power of which it gave proof. A microscopic 
examination would doubtless have caused a recognition of 
the presence of spermatozoa in the ducts of this neoplastic 
testicle. 

Puberty is then a purely germinal affair and the matur- 
ity of the germen itself an affair of nutrition. 

The observations of Dr. Gandy prove, on their side, that 
for the maintenance of the attributes with which puberty has 
endowed the soma, it is necessary that the germen subsist. 
In the case of Dr. Sacchi, the suppression of the acciden- 
tally mature, germen of the neoplastic testicle carried along 
with it the disappearance of all the signs of reproductive _ 
power prematurely appeared, but did not influence at all 1 
the natural evolution of the boy toward his normal puberty, 
because there remained with the other testicle, a sound ger- f 
men; while the total suppression of the germen at some mo- 
ment of the virile period exposes to a turn backwards, to 
a reversion, that is, to the loss of the secondary sexual char- 
acteristics which had accompanied puberty. 

The presence or the absence of these characteristics de- 



Puberty 89 

termines some profoundly different conditions. These 
pathological cases demonstrate it in a striking fashion by 
reason of the ages at which the changes happen, and be- 
cause they appear without transition. But, under the re- 
serve of transitions, it does not occur otherwise for well 
children and the difference is complete between a child who 
has not reached puberty and a pubescent child, boy or girl. 

Some somatic conditions of psychological puberty^ — an 
example. — Some years ago two brothers accompanied by 
their parents presented themselves at my Tuesday con- 
sultations. Both were seventeen years old ; they were twins. 
The family was perplexed. The career of diplomat opened 
itself exceptionally for both, but only one of the two showed 
what one might call aptitude for the career. Besides, the 
differences between the two brothers were many and pro- 
found. That did not escape the father and mother who 
were greatly disturbed by it. Of those two boys, seven- 
teen years old, the one bore himself like a man, the other 
like a young vagabond, and that in everything. 

At twelve years, said the father, his son George had al- 
ready almost lost childish habits which were observed in 
James at seventeen years. They had had him carefully ex- 
amined, but it was certified to them that his constitution 
was good, and that his mental state had nothing abnormal. 
His professors recognized in him real intelligence and a 
quick memory, but they complained of his extreme thought- 
lessness. 

The young men having stripped, a thing which had not 
been done at the preceding visits to the physician, the par- 
ents told me, it was evident for the father as for me that 
George was pubescent and James was not. In George 
puberty had been reached at about the age of twelve years. 
That was five years ago. George was now an adult, while 



90 Growth During School Age 

James, of the same age and size was still only a child. 
George was nubile, James was not yet pubescent. 

I was in the presence of two individuals of the same age, 
and yet the one was a man, and the other was not even a 
young man (jeune homme). They were of equal stature 
and their weights were very nearly the same, as was their 
chest girth. What combination of these three measures 
was capable of giving information on the physical value of 
these boys.P They withstood in a very unequal manner 
an exertion a trifle prolonged; not only did the adult show 
a resistance far superior, but he was able, after a short 
rest, to resume the interrupted work, a thing which his twin 
brother could not do, who needed to prolong the period of 
rest in order to rest his legs, his arnls, and to recover his 
energy. 

The three measures, height, girth and weight had taught 
us nothing regarding these two young men, not more con- 
cerning their physical worth than concerning the causes of 
the profound differences which held between them. Puberty 
by itself, had already made us better acquainted with them 
and had furnished us some instructions on the divergencies 
of their two individualities. 

The anthropometric, physiological, and clinical examina- 
tion showed us that the proportions in James were still pre- 
pubescent proportions, that is, that they answered to the 
intersegmentary relations which are met with in children 
who touch the period of puberty. I thought that puberty 
would arrive normally, in spite of its delay, by reason of the 
regular conditions of the general state, and of the partial 
evolutions, on the part of the testicles, and of the teeth, 
etc. The cranium was proportionally small, even for a 
macroskele like James, the limbs were too long, relatively to 



Puberty 91 

the bust, a relation which of course is proper on the eve of 
puberty. 

I was able to say nothing of the dangers of the unequal 
growth, because I had not followed these young boys since 
the age of eight or ten years from semester to semester, 
and because the evaluations, in this order of ideas, are only 
the result of comparison among themselves of the dimen- 
sions of a like segment at the successive semesters. 

The muscles were average, and respiration had retained 
the amplitude of that of childhood; it was more transversal 
than vertical, while in the twin brother it was more vertical 
than transversal, which is an adult characteristic. 

I could, with good conscience, reassure the parents and 
make them foresee a transformation shortly, a germinal 
transformation with its somatic and cerebral consequences, 
without, however, determining precisely its range from the 
point of view of organic resources and of energy, because I 
had not followed the boy since a number of semesters before. 

Before the time of the appearance of puberty it was nec- 
essary to be careful to make a decision relative to his 
[James's] future and not despair at all. And in fact, 
puberty did not delay in arriving and changing the boy into 
a man in every way. 

The orientation of ideas of this big boy, incontestibly 
intelligent, had been strongly influenced by the contacts 
which his age and size had imposed on him, with his pubes- 
cent comrades. He had lived their life, he had wished to 
do as they did, he who had not reached the same phase of 
evolution and did not yet possess the genital, physical, and 
mental attributes with which his comrades and even his twin 
brother were already endowed. The objective harmoniza- 
tion, the eff^ort of action had found themselves fatally in 



92 Growth During School Age 

contradiction with the resources, with the possibilities of 
this non-pubescent. 

Separation of pubescents and non-pubescent s. — ^From like 
circumstances there arises an evil which has, for appreci- 
able effect, instability. You conceive the danger to which 
a child is exposed who is placed in the midst of children 
possessing attributes which he himself does not possess. 
What vain efforts that provokes in him; what mental dis- 
order follows; what tendencies that develops to seek out- 
side himself or in reverie what he is not able to realize with 
the means at his disposal, and that towards which, never- 
theless, he is driven by the examples about him and by the 
need of raising himself up to those who affect, in his regard, 
some attractions of superiority which he has hastened to 
imitate in order to suffer no more from it. 

This example, which I emphasize in passing, indicates to 
you already in what sense psychological puberty is more 
complex or perhaps more simple than it has been described 
and shows to your cautioned sagacity glimpses of the con- 
ditions which observation exacts in order to see and under- 
stand thoroughly. 

Pedagogically, there is in every case one conclusion which 
is imposed; that is the separation of the pubescents from 
the non-pubescents. Intellectual culture as well as moral 
is interested in this separation. 

Beyond the kindergarten, continue to keep together, if 
you desire, girls and boys. But, by a close co-operation 
with the physician and enlightened yourself by the second- 
ary signs, watch carefully for the appearance of puberty. 
As soon as it appears in a schoolboy or schoolgirl promote 
this modified organism into the category of pubescents; do 
not take account of the age. Neither see any obstacle in 
the multiplication of courses. The administrative author- 



Puberty 93 

ity, having been notified, will take the measures necessary 
to render your task possible in the interests of the little in- 
dividualities which it confides to you. 

But, you say, pubescent and non-pubescent brothers live 
together under the paternal roof. On this account, the 
same roof sheltering permanently girls and boys in the fam- 
ily circle, of what good are your distinct schools for each 
sex? It is because a special sentiment reigns at the fireside, 
which is born there and with a special charm, it is the senti- 
ment of protection owed to the small by the large, to the 
young by the older, to the feeble by the strong, to the girl 
by the boy. Outside of the family, do not count on it, while 
applying yourself with all your might to develop it or to 
nurture it, and do not hesitate to use, to this end, puberal 
selection. Its effects are incalculable. 

The familiar imitation of family life of Bedales, of Ab- 
botsholmes, in England, where the professor, his wife and 
their children group around them in an isolated dwelling 
some twenty scholars, is raised by a hundred cubits above 
the best boarding-schools. E. Demolins understood this 
point well when he founded "I'Ecole Nouvelle" although he 
was able only to approach that ideal. But a gulf remains 
between the mentality which presides in fraternal relations 
and that which presides in the relations of scholars among 
each other, even in the bosom of these family schools. 
Whence the necessity, there as elsewhere, of puberal se- 
lection. 



CHAPTER VIII 

PUBERTY (continued) 

Duration of period of puberty; signs of debut; signs of ter- 
mination. — Internubilo- pubescent period or youth. — 
Distance from puberty to nubility or adult state. — 
Some educational considerations touching these peri- 
ods, — Synthesis of the relations of the reproductive ele- 
ment and growth; phases of life in function of repro- 
duction. — Influence on growth of the traumatic sup- 
pression of the germen, 

IT is not imagined by people in general and often not 
even by us, educators or physicians, what past a retarda- 
tion of the "formation" reveals, and what future it pre- 
pares for. There results from it a complete ignorance of 
the duties which it imposes, such as the preparation for 
puberty, preparation for the post-puberal phase, the util- 
ization of the "educative moments" of the diverse organs 
for general or special physical or intellectual culture. 

Where then can the educator get information of the ex- 
act place which puberty occupies in the evolution of the 
child .f^ Where can he find notions relative to its duration, 
to the distance which separates it from the adult age ? There 
is in the study of this subject, however, some information 
which is far from being indifferent to the direction of edu- 
cation, because it concerns the very conditions of the influ- 
ence of puberty. But growth had not yet been studied at 
all from this point of view although one could expect only 

94 



1 



Puberty 95 

from it precise information on these important questions. 
Now the age of taking possession of the organism by puberty 
varies with each individual. The principle cause, we have 
learned, is the quality of placental nutrition. 

Duration of period of puberty; signs of debut; signs of 
termination. — ^As to the time which puberty takes to install 
itself, it is the same in all normal children almost, say two 
years. At the moment of appearance, one has noted down 
for the growth of the hair of the pubis and of the armpits, 
P^ A^. On following the same child one notes later P* A^, 
then P^ AS finally P^ A^, or A^, or A^ At this last nota- 
tion, P^ A^ (A^ or A^) the installation of puberty is an ac- 
complished fact. Two years have passed since the appear- 
ance, and if the child was then fifteen and one-half years 
old, he is now seventeen and one-half. During these two 
years, growth has progressed in a somewhat special man- 
ner under the influence of the new impulsion which the soma 
has just received from the germen. The rate of increase in 
height is a trifle lessened, and the child has commenced to fill 
out, to augment his dimensions of breadth and thickness; 
his muscles have become stouter, the truncal segment of the 
bust, the trunk, where are grouped the transforming and 
distributing visceral organs, has gained in amplitude and 
its capacity, which is proportionally reduced since birth, 
has commenced to take up more room in the organism. 
From now on, the trunk will not cease to gain in extent un- 
til the end of the time of growth (v. "Laws of Growth," 
pp. 109 and 116). 

Internubilo- puberal period or youth; distance from 
puberty to nubility. — Immediately after the closing of the 
puberal phase, growth undergoes a very notable slacken- 
ing, and it is so much the more obvious that it follows 
closely the augmentations which characterize puberty, the 



96 Growth During School Age 

first year of its evolution especially. Plates I, II, IV, V, 
XV and XVI. 

There is a reduction of the rate of increase but the or- 
ganism continues, however, to grow in all directions : all the 
dimensions could figure in a table intended to make the aug- 
mentations of the internubilo-puberal period stand out ; but 
they would also appear with the very unequal reductions 
which have attended their growth, causing to be presented 
the changes which result from it in the proportions of the 
body. 

A few measurements answering to the principal dimen- 
sions of the body are to be compared to the same measure- 
ments taken from the adult, and make thoroughly compre- 
hensive the difference between the state of the child at the 
end of the puberal period and his adult state. These data 
are grouped in the following short table: 

Average child 
at the close Average 
, of his puberty adult difference 

Weight (stripped) 56 64 8 kilos 

Breadth (transversal chest dia.) 258 269 11 mm. 

Thickness (anterior-posterior chest dia.) 191 199 8 " 

Girth (max. thigh girth) 481 506 25 " 

Height (stature) 1636 1659 23 " 



I 



) . 



At an epoch of life when the adipose tissue, the fat, still 
holds only a negligible place, in the great majority, these 8 
kilos to be acquired represent an important amplification 
of the tissues ; the elongation of the stature not having to 
exceed 23 millimeters, that shows especially, the broad plas-l 
ticity, that is, breadth, thickness, girth will gain in dimen-J 
sion. I 

Girth will augment 25 millimeters. The average child^ 
will then increase more in girth than he will grow in height 
during this period and that, without appreciable participa- 



Puberty 97 

tion of adipose tissue. Embracing the entire period of boy- 
hood, it is seen that the average child between thirteen and 
one-half years and the adult age, increases his weight by 
27 kilos, his breadth by 51 mm., his thickness by 40, his girth 
by 96 and the length of his upper limbs by a total of 115, 
while his stature increases 207 millimeters. 

If one compares to this growth in volume, considered in 
each category as equal to 100, each of the annual increases 
of this same period, one will account for the proportional 
part of increase which remains to be realized beyond seven- 
teen and one-half years. This table, which is interesting, 
but offers a certain complexity, can be reduced to the fol- 
lowing approximate fractions, which renders its reading 
easy. 

Having admitted that, from thirteen and one-half years 
to adult age, the growth of the child had to gain, in each 
of the directions considered, a certain number of millime- 
ters, and that, in each of these directions, we evaluate at 
100 this total gain, how many per cent has the young man 
of seventeen years to acquire in order to be an adult.? 

The pubescent lad of seventeen years, in order to be- 
come an adult must gain: 

Weight 29% or 1/3 approx. 

Breadth 21% or 1/5 

Thickness 20% or 1/5 

Girth 26% or i^ 

Height 11% or Vio 

Length of upper limbs 23% or l^ 

From the close of puberty to adult age, weight has more 
to acquire than it has done in the course of the most active 
year between thirteen and eighteen years. It is wholly dif- 
ferent with height whose proportional part of growth to 
be furnished is less than that of any one of prepuberal and 
puberal years. As to the other dimensions, they have to 



98 Growth During School Age 

furnish only the proportional increase of a good average 
year, and they have three years to accomplish that. In 
effect, on taking account of the progressive reduction of the 
rate of growth, one comes to evaluate at three years, the 
time necessary to the completion of the development of the 
average young man, that is, five years from the dawn of 
puberty. Thus the pubescent boy (15^ years) would be- 
come an adult at twenty-one years (twenty and one-half 
years). That is admissible, for, in the regiment, it is ex- 
ceptional to observe any important increases in size, ex- 
cluding the volunteer recruits of eighteen to nineteen years. 
I have become convinced of this, in measuring a great num- 
ber of soldiers on their arrival at the corps and on the eve 
of their discharge. 

In its turn, the soma has completed its development. It 
is here in condition to give perfect co-operation to the ger- 
men, in view of reproduction; nubility is accomplished, 
physiologically speaking. 

It is the duty of educators to distinguish biological and 
social nubility: "biological nubility, so understood, is only 
the fitness for marriage considered solely from the biolog- 
ical point of view. From the sociological and moral point 
of view, marriage implies some conditions and a maturity 
which render the question of nubility much more complex 
( Manouvrier) ." 

Thus, then, puberty takes two years to install itself. The 
perfecting of the soma, or the internubilo-puberal period 
lasts three years; it is then a period of five years from the 
moment of appearance of puberty, from P^ A-^, which is re- 
quired for a young boy to become a nubile man, an adult, 
a reproducer as perfect as his individual condition will per- 
mit him to be. 

When you know that the notation P^ A^ is recorded on 



Puberty 99 

the individual record card of your son, you know, parents, 
that in five years he will be nubile. If he is fifteen and one- 
half years old when P^ A^ is recorded, at twenty and one- 
half years he will be nubile ; if he reaches P^ A^ at seventeen 
years only, he will reach his nubility at twenty-two years. 
When, on the contrary, puberty dawns at twelve years, your 
son will be an adult at seventeen years. 

And if you will kindly remember that there is a matter 
other than a question of physical development, a matter 
other than a purely somatic growth, you will recognize that 
this question has a claim to your most diligent attention. 

Out of these five years, stretching from the dawn of 
puberty to the realization of nubility, the last three espe- 
cially, correspond to the phase to which more than any other, 
the name youth agrees. The pubescent boy has become a 
youth (jeune homme). 

In the feminine sex, according to the authors and my 
observations, the distance which separates puberty from 
nubility can likewise be estimated at five years, and it can 
be considered that the little girl becomes a girl ("jeune 
fiUe") two years after the dawn of puberty. Five years 
after the appearance of the first menses, the girl is nubile; 
she is a woman. 

Some educational considerations touching these 'periods. 
— ^Young people are morally and cerebrally, on the morrow 
after puberty, what the struggle which takes place within 
them, makes them. In animals, most often, the internubilo- 
puberal period does not exist. When the animal is "ma- 
ture" he is at once pubescent and nubile. There are, how- 
ever, some exceptions. 

The phase of youth ought to be the triumph of education ; 
it can be the failure of it. It is necessary that the prepara- 
tion of education should have been such that, in the young 



100 Growth During School Age 

man, everything lends to perfect his individual resources in 
the precise direction of the position which he wishes to oc- 
cupy in society, while his soma itself completes the perfec- 
tion which a reproductive function useful to the race ex- 
acts. "Youth" pronounces judgment on the education of 
the child. It is the cross-road where temperament, educa- 
tion and life meet. It depends in great part on education 
whether youth be knocked about and onerous or made har- 
monious and pleasant. 

Synthesis of the relations of the reproductive element and 
growth, — The puberal phase is, as we have just seen, a time 
of human development in which the germinal power orien- 
tates all the forces of the organism towards the function of 
reproduction. It had impressed a first general impulse 
from the time of the egg. Twelve or fifteen years later, it 
gives a second more special impulse. The soma is consti- 
tuted and the objective is approached, but the impulse is 
analagous. 

In reality, the evolution of the reproductive function 
holds under its dependence the entire life of the soma. It 
imposes upon it (the soma) its natural phases by the setting 
which it gives these phases. 

On page 103 is a table of it, the relations of the phases of 
life with the function of reproduction, in which it is seen 
that to each of the periods of evolution of thegermen cor- 
responds a period so strongly characteristic of life that it 
is impossible to represent it to one's self otherwise de- 
limited. 

Growth has made us acquainted with the effects of the 
puberal impulse stamped upon the soma by the germen. 
It has shown us what the soma had to pass over in order to 
realize the best conditions of which it might be capable in 
its role of agent of the function of reproduction. 



Puberty 101 

Influence upon growth of the traumatic suppression of the 
germen {eunuch), — ^We should be interested in knowing 
what occurs, how the soma behaves when the germen disap- 
pears before the puberal age, and what, consequently, pub- 
erty does not do. 

We see the result in the eunuch, and particularly in those 
SJcoptzy, coachmen, of whom Pittard speaks in his impor- 
tant studies on the anthropometric modifications effected by 
castration (Modifications anthropometriques apportees par 
las castration. Bulletin de la Societe des Sciences de 
Bucharest, nos. 3-4; 1903). — ". . . Others go to Jassy or 
to Bucharest to follow the calling of coachmen . . . ; they 
are recognized very easily by their bloated, smooth face, by 
their woman's voice. , . . When they are seated on the box 
of their carriage, one can only with difficulty imagine their 
stature. It is because their stature is made up principally 
of the exaggerated length of the legs. At several returns," 
continues Dr. Pittard, "we have received the hospitality 
of the Shoptzy, either in 1901 or in 1902, hospitality, more- 
over, limited to a few meals taken while we were examining 
them. We had been struck by the tall stature of the most 
of them, by their smooth, fresh face, their feminine voice, 
the softness of their skin which at the same time presented 
an aspect of freshness, of youthfulness, and of suppleness. 
Nearly all wore long, straight, dark hair, falling in locks 
down over the countenance. In order to honor us, they 
had done their hair over with pomade or oil. Their hands 
were delicate, tapering, and supple, like the hands of a 
woman" {loc. cit., p. 182, 183). 

Here were some adults who presented in an exaggerated 
fashion, the proportions of a child on the eve of puberty; 
seated they had the aspect of children by the slight height 
of the part of their body which rises above the seat, as well 



102 Growth During School Age 

as by their visage of which Pittard emphasized the appear- 
ance, fresh ("poupine"). Erect, they were adults, at least 
in stature. From infancy, the soma appeared to be modi- 
fied only by the elongation of the limbs; the aspect of the 
visage, the absolute length of the trunk, the condition of the 
skin had not changed. 

Pittard emphasizes the inferiority of the volume of the 
brain in these men, of Russian (Petits Russiens) descent, 
compared to the volume of the brain of their kindred, not 
emasculated. The action of the germen, its influence upon 
growth is then demonstrated to us by the modifications 
which this action undergoes in its absence. If, with numer- 
ous modern authors, one attributes the elongation of the 
bones, to hypophysis, the hyperactivity of this gland to in- 
ternal secretion, manifesting itself in the eunuch only after 
castration, will itself represent an eff*ect of the suppression 
of the germen. Besides, one will be able to determine with 
precision the results of the prepuberal suppression of the 
germen only in subjects emasculated before the age of 
twelve years, and better before the age of six years, the end 
of the first period of post-foetal evolution, then followed 
from semester to semester with all the resources of the aux- 
anological method. 

The observations and experimentations on animals with 
which I have occupied myself a long time in accordance with 
the counsels which Professor Milne-Edwards had very 
kindly given me in 1896, have furnished me some interesting 
results, but they are applicable to the human species only 
with great reservation. 



Puberty 



103 



PHASES OF LIFE 
IN FUNCTION OF THE REPRODUCTIVE ELEMENT 



the germen 

issue of reproduction. 

Period constitutive of the elements 

of seminal offspring 
The seminal offspring finishes its 
constitution and vegetates 

(birth). 

Agenital life, sleep of the germen. 

The seminal offspring completes 

its evolution, awakening of the 

germen: 

PUBERTY 

Internubilo-puberal period. 

The mature germen awaits the 
maturity of the soma. Matur- 
ing of the somatic factor of re- 
production. Nubility. 

Fulness of reproductive function 
Extinction of seminal off- 



spring .... 
Agerminal life 



EMBRYO-FOETAL 
PHASE 



INFANCY 



YOUTH 



ADULT PHASE 



OLD AGE 

Continuity 

of the life of the 

germen by the descendant. 

^ The term adolescence is admitted to designate the last phase of 
infancy, the peri-puberal phase. 



CHAPTER IX 

SOME LAWS OF GROWTH 

Laws and method. — Make-up of the laws of growth. — Law 
of alternation. — Laws of puberty. — Laws of propor- 
tion. — Principle of irregular puberal growth. — 
Resume and formulas of the laws of growth. 

THE laws and the method in matter of growth. — Buf- 
fon had formulated a general law of growth in length 
which all oboervations since have confirmed. "There is some- 
thing quite remarkable in the growth of the human body," he 
wrote; "the foetus in the mother's womb grows constantly 
more and more until the moment of birth; the child, on the 
contrary, gj'ows constantly less and less until the age of 
puberty." 

The law of Buff on is one of the rare ones which, only con- 
sidering the height, is applicable to the development of the 
whole body. That is due to its very generality. Some 
other authors have treated the very notable elongation 
which precedes puberty ; but they do not fix the moment of 
the appearance of puberty. 

The sexual differences of growth of height have given 
place to some divergence of opinion, such that it is no longer 
permissible to formulate any general rule as to the rhythm 
of elongation. That is not much to be regretted, the height 
being considered alone. That was, however, to be foreseen, 
and it will be so, as long as the simultaneous, hasty method 
will be substituted for the scientific method, so long as the 

104 



Some Laws of Growth 105 

observer will not take the time and the pains to follow the 
same children and to take on each of them all the useful 
measurements and notations patiently repeated at each 
semester. 

Let us recall that, for want of using this method and in 
taking the stature as the criterion of growth, should the 
measurement of height be accompanied by that of chest girth 
and weight, one is infallibly led to this conclusion at least 
strange, that among the finest specimens of which human 
kind can pride itself, the eunuch occupies a place of honor. 

Eunuchs of 180 cm. are not rare, their habitual embon- 
point assures them large figures for chest girth and weight. 
So that in a table where height, girth and weight in view of 
an appreciation of physical- value, and whatever other com- 
binations imagined by means of these three numerical ex- 
pressions, might be recorded, the most of these infirm people 
would appear as excellent recruits. 



But, and this is serious, to what phenomena has the method 
of unique, simultaneous examination at the diverse ages, and 
reduced to some measurements, to what phenomena of the 
development of the being would it have helped us? What 
rhythm would it have enabled us to understand? What 
general rules would it have led us to formulate? 

It belonged to the periodical and polymetric method, to 
what we have called the auxanological, in order to group 
around its object, growth, its physiological, clinical, and 
anthropometrical resources, it was reserved to the auxano- 
logical methods to make these observations, to disengage 
the rhythm of growth, to investigate the explanations of 
it and to infer some general rules from it. It belonged to 
this method to make the departure between true growth and 



106 Growth During School Age 

what has been too long considered as its expression, to de- 
termine a certain number of variations and to verify some 
of their causes. 

Make-up of the laws of growth. — Be careful not to infer 
from this that the rhythms of growth are all semestral. 
However, when BufFon directed the measurements of M. 
Gueneau de Montbeillard, he had seen that the semester cor- 
responds to a certain number of rhythms, and he caused oth- 
ers to see it. 

The law of alternation. — And now, let us try to render 
ourselves an account of how the facts lead to a law of 
growth, taking, for example, the law of alternation. The 
multiple measurements, which are evidently laborious, pro- 
cure at least some large scientific compensation. They per- 
mit, for each half-year, the reconstituting of the segments 
with their absolute dimensions. In calculating their rela- 
tions to each other, one can establish their relative dimen- 
sions, and know on which segment of the bust or the limbs, 
the process of growth has borne with the greatest activity, 
in the course of the semester at the end of which the child 
is measured. This is applied to increases in thickness and 
breadth as to increases in length. 

Segmental growth corresponds to the increase of a small 
group of bones, and, for the segments of limbs, to that of a 
long isolated bone, like the thigh or arm, or to that of two 
long twin bones as the leg and the forearm. The elonga- 
tion of one of these segments represents, consequently, the 
elongation of the corresponding long bone, of the femur or 
of the tibia and fibula, of the humerus or of the radius and 
ulna. 

In the vicinity of the ankle or wrist, the muscles are re- 
duced to their tendons, very often bound in the grooves of 
the bones. At this point, the thickness measured is a thick- 



Some Laws of Growth 107 

ness of bone, relative to the muscular thickness which repre- 
sents the maximal circumference of the segment. 

I compared, in 1897, the changes which had taken place 
in the segments of limbs of the children of "I'Ecole des An- 
delys," measured during seven semesters with those of which 
the homologous segments had been the basis in the pupils of 
"I'Ecole de St-Hyppolyte-du-Fort," seeking to determine 
the influence of the very diff^erent climate of these two lo- 
calities. 

I believed at first I would have to consider erroneous the 
first results of the calculations which showed the growth in 
bulk at another semester than the elongation, or at least, 
which made the minima of the elongation correspond to the 
maxima of increase in bulk. Presently the precision which 
this fact took by the side of the bones of the leg and of the 
forearm, throughout the comparison of the results of the 
same order in the two schools, showed me that there was no 
error nor exception there, and that the increase in bulk was 
efl'ected with activity only when the activity of elongation 
had slackened. 

I noted carefully this observation without attaching to 
it at the time any general import. In 1900 I worked up 
the part of my researches destined to the making-up of my 
work on the growth of the diverse parts of the body in the 
aA'erage child. The individual repetition of the same rela- 
tions and the striking comparisons of the semestral in- 
creases in length and thickness of a like segment of the aver- 
age child, imposed themselves upon me with the validity of 
a principle, namely, the elongation and increase in thickness 
are not simultaneous, but alternative. 

The average adolescent put thus in relief the opposing 
rhythm of the elongation of two long consecutive bones ; 
when the femur elongated the tibia grew in thickness, and 



108 Growth During School Age 

when the femur grew in thickness, the tibia elongated. It 
was not a question of suppression of the elongation when 
the growth of thickness was taking place, but of a reduc- 
tion of the rate of elongation and vice versa. The rhythm 
of this growth of bones was, besides, semestral. 

One hundred children followed from semester to semes- 
ter, of thirteen to eighteen years, contributed their meas- 
urements for the making up of the average. After them, 
one hundred- thirty others, followed in the same fashion, 
formed the reserve, the check to the circumstance. 

Nothing in the facts gathered could be charged as fortui- 
tous, and I was, without being able to doubt it, in the pres- 
ence of a general rule. The result of the working up of my 
researches demonstrated to me the biological import of this 
law,^ from which arose directly or indirectly the great ma- 
jority of the phenomena of growth springing from the ob- 
servation counted or noted down. 

That fact led of itself to diverse formulas : 

Lengthening of two consecutive long bones. The periods 
of activity and of rest which succeed each other at half- 
year intervals in the increase in length of a long bone are 
opposed for two consecutive long bones of a like limb. 

Lengthening and thickening of a long bone. The rests 
and the elongation are utilized by the increase in thickness 
and vice versa. The long bone grows in thickness and elon-j 
gates alternately and not simultaneously. 

It is accepted that osseous growth is subject to alterna-^ 
tions. The alternations with their irregularities are, for 
the development of the body,- one of the characteristics of 

^ See on the subject of "The Law of Alternation," pages 107, 108, 111, 
119, 120, 122, 123, 127, 128, 134, 175 and 176 of my Recherches anthro- 
pometriques sur la croissance des diverses parties du corps, 224 pp. 
Paris, Maloine, pub. 1902-1903. 



i 



Some Laws of Growth 109 

biological progression, which they differentiate from the 
arithmetical progression of Quetelet. 

The alternations do not depend upon the seasons. The 
first law demonstrates, in fact, that the half-yearly peri- 
odicity does not imply any seasonal influence. With still 
more reason, the* seasons do not have any influence on the 
alternations which escape this periodicity. 

The alternations undergo a preponderant influence on the 
part of puberty. 

The half-year represents the average duration of alterna- 
tion of a great number of increases in growth. Puberty is 
the center around which the great alternations evolve. 

Laws of puberty, — ^We have seen that the reproductive 
element, the germen, had a considerable influence on the 
eff^ects of growth and that it has no equal except that influ- 
ence which the germen exercises on the somatic off'spring 
from the ovule. 

At the present time, it is a question of the influence of 
the germen on the secondary causes of growth. 

A certain number of laws of puberty are dependent upon 
the more general law of alternation. 

Bust and lower limbs. — Height owes the greatest part of 
its development before puberty, to the lower limbs, after 
puberty, to the bust. Plate X, A. 

This fact finds its explanation and its cause in the phe- 
nomena of augmented growth and of reduced growth which 
we have just carefully studied. We have seen, in fact, that 
puberty favored the auxanological activity of the connective 
tissues and reduced, on the contrary, the growth of car- 
tilaginous tissues. The cartilaginous organs consequently 
offer an activity of growth much less and for some almost 
none, beginning with the period of puberty; the connective 



110 Growth During School Age 

cartilage undergoes like the others this puberal influence, 
and the elongation of the long bones which proceeds from 
it feels the effects of it directly. By the contrary, the or- 
gans which grow by the connective tissue, augment their 
dimensions. This is the case of the growth in thickness of 
the long bones which is secured by the periosteum. We are 
able to generalize these remarks and say: 

The osteogenic periosteal activity of the cartilage, domi- 
nated hy the osteogenic activity of the cartilage before 
puberty, prevails over it after puberty. 

Whence this corollary is derived: 

Elongation and increase in thickness of bones : The prog- 
ress of elongation of the bones excels before puberty; the 
progress of increase in thickness of the bones excels during 
and after puberty. 

How then is it possible not to foresee the puberal rela- 
tions of increase of height and of weight which result log- 
ically from what precedes .^^ 

The principal peripuberal increases of height are pro- 
duced during the three semesters which precede puberty; the 
principal peripuberal increases of weight take place during 
the three semesters which follow. Plate X, B. 

Among the tissues whose rate of growth is augmented by 
the intervention of puberty, figures the muscular tissue. The 
contrast with the increase in length of the osseous tissue is 
clearly marked ; and as the elongation is the most easily ap- 
preciable of the manifestation of growth of bones, one can f 
express this fact in the terms which I used in 1902 : growth 
is above all osseous before puberty and above all muscular 
after it. Plate X, C. 

One of the total growths which the germen at the mo- 
ment of perfection of the evolution of its offspring pro- i 
vokes, bears on the hair. The appearance of these organs. 



Some Laws of Growth 111 

destined to replace the down, precedes by a trifle the dawn 
of pubert;^ itself. The hairs are multiplied during the 
course of the appearance of puberty, and until the puberal 
phase is completed or, at least, at this time, the hairs of the 
pubis and of the armpits have become as tufted as they are 
going to be, and, if the fleece continues to grow thicker, it 
is outside of these two regions. 

Observation by the auxanological method has permitted 
of establishing the relations between the shoot of the hairs 
and the evolution of puberty; it has also permitted their 
formulation with precision. 

Shoot of the hairs and puberty: The debut of the shoot 
of pubic hairs P^ precedes by three semesters, on an average, 
the dawn of puberty P^ A^. 

In the two sexes, the debut of the shoot of the hairs of the 
armpits corresponds almost exactly to the dawn of puberty. 

Now, A-"^ which expresses it, corresponds to P^, so that 
this is one of the eff^ects itself of puberty, namely, a total 
growth, which reveals it to the observer. It is not a question 
of coincidence but a relation of cause to eff^ect, which ex- 
plains the constancy of the relation between the phenome- 
non itself and its exterior manifestation. 

The end of the shoot of the hairs, on the pubis and in the 
arm-pits, that is, the moment when the fleece, observed half- 
yearly, has attained its greatest degree of density, is noted 
by P^ A^ and that corresponds to the end of the establishing 
of puberty. 

The end of puberty, its duration. P^ A^ which marks 
the end of the puberal phase, survives four semesters (^about 
two years) after P^ A-^. 

The comparison which leads to the noting of the succes- 
sive powers of P and of A, is made between the condition 
in the present semester and the condition in the preceding 



112 Growth During School Age 

semester of the pubic fleece or that of the arm-pit in the 
same child, which gives a relative value to it, but exclusively 
individual. The density of the hair answering to P^ A^ 
in a child, can represent only the value P^ A^ in another. 

Consequently, as soon as one perceives the hair on the 
pubis, he can consider that the dawn of puberty will take 
place in three semesters, two years at the most. From the 
time when P^ A^ is noted in a boy, it is necessary to count 
about two years before he will have passed the puberal period 
and attained the notation P^ A^. And three years will have 
to elapse in order that the internubilo-puberal period termi- 
nate in nubility, and realize the conditions which constitute 
the adult state. 

Whence this law: 

Place of puberty in the evolution of growth. Twelve to 
seventeen years separate puberty from birth. Two years 
suffice for puberty to establish itself, beyond which three 
years are necessary in order to attain to nubility. 

In consequence, puberty in its relations with the evolu- 
tion of growth, shows no variation except in the time of 
its appearance. When puberty dawns, the child finds him- 
self five years from his nubility, the condition of his adult 
state. 

A girl who reaches puberty at seventeen is nubile, is mar- 
riageable only at twenty-two years. While another, her sis- 
ter perhaps, in whom the appearance of puberty occurred at 
the age of twelve years, has already effected her nubility 
at seventeen years. The latter is already a woman when 
the other is still only a child. It is the same for the mas- 
culine sex as the case of the twin brothers has shown. 

The difference is considerable between twelve and seven- 
teen years, and these differences, especially in two sisters, 
are not explicable, unless the cause is acknowledged which 



Some Laws of Growth 113 

I indicated in a memorandum to the Academy of Science of 
November 13, 1911, and was considered above; I mean the 
quality of placental alimentation. We saw that the one 
of the two twin brothers best nourished in the palcenta, de- 
veloped the first. It appears then that one were warranted 
in believing that : Puberty is precocious or tardy according 
to the quality of alimentation by tne placenta. 

The subsiding which is operative in the rate of growth in 
height from the semester which immediately precedes pub- 
erty, and which besides will only cause itself to be accen- 
tuated, has been interpreted by authors as a gathering itself 
up of the organism on the eve of the great effort which it is 
going to make. We are now prepared to interpret this fact 
physiologically and anatomically and to consider it as a case 
of the law of alternation, a case susceptible of being pre- 
dicted by him who is informed on the influence of the germen 
upon the growth of the divers tissues, by him who knows 
that the articular cartilages like the others lose at this mo- 
ment the major part of their activity of growth, and that, 
consequently, the long bones, either quite cease to grow in 
length, or indeed reduce considerably their growth in this 
direction. The reduction of the increase of stature has no 
other cause at this epoch. 

Perhaps the term "gathering up" (recueillement) is not 
fitted to an organism whose most important part, the trunk 
as well as the neck, has no tendency to reduce its growth, 
and on the contrary, begins to grow (grossir) very actively. 

It is a question of an alternation in the increases as one 
observes when he follows a child from semester to semester, 
certain increases of length giving place to others of the same 
direction, either to some increases in breadth or to some in 
thickness. However that may be, the organism remains too 
active to be a question of "gathering up." That shows once 



114 Growth During School Age 

more how little the stature represents the growth of the hu- 
man organism, and to what errors of interpretation it can 
lead. 

From all the foregoing we conclude: The phase which 
immediately precedes puberty does not differ from other 
phases of growth in balanced children, and at this moment as 
at others, the organism takes only partial repose, conform- 
ably to the law of alternation. 

Changes of puberal coloration. Hair, Puberty renders 
the coloration of the hair darker in 28 cases out of 100. 
Skin. Puberty causes the appearance of a brown pigment 
on the skin of the perigenital parts of the body in 30 cases 
out of 100. Eyes. 63 cases out of 100 modify the color 
of the eyes (coloration of the pigment of the iris) at the mo- 
ment of puberty; in 18 cases out of 100 it becomes darker; 
in 45 cases out of 100 it becomes lighter. 

Laws of proportions. — This question was taken up al- 
ready in Chapter III, and we shall have for use the study 
of the proportions at the time of the making up of the "in- 
dividual formula." We here again find the dominating in- 
fluence of alternation and that of puberty. 

There are three phases in the evolution of the variations 
presented by the proportions of length and of breadth of 
body. The first from birth to six years; the second from six 
to fifteen years; the third from fifteen years to adult age. 
Plates I and V. 

// the proportional increase is superior to that of stature 
for one segment of the body, it is inferior to it for the seg- 
ment situated immediately below or above. There is there a 
novel aspect of the law of alternation which can be ex- 
pressed in a more general fashion : The law of alternation 
governs the proportional increases of the segments of the 
body, as it governs their absolute increases. 



Some Laws of Growth 115 

The variations of the proportions of length and of 
breadth of the body are profoundly modified by puberty 
which subjects them to the laws of orientation and aug- 
mentation. 

Such segment which progresses relatively more than the 
stature until puberty falls behind beyond the puberal age: 
this is the case of the pelvic members. Such other segment 
which falls behind the stature before puberty gains on it 
when puberty is crossed. So then : Puberty has a decisive 
influence on the direction of the variations of the proportions 
of length and of breadth. 

The proportions of breadth, in general, present their own 
variations which are in correlation with those of the propor- 
tions of length of the trumk. 

The reduction of the proportions to height of the visceral 
cavity reaches its extreme limit at puberty. 



Principle of irregular growth. — ^Among the puberal laws, 
there is one of them which derives directly from the embryo- 
genie power of which puberty gives proof; I mean the 
principle of irregular growth, in its physiological role and 
in its eventual pathological role. 

The effects of irregular increase are subject to the law of 
alternation and remain physiological. 

As soon as a cause makes irregular increase escape from 
the law of alternation, its effects are in danger of becoming 
pathological. 

Besides traumatism, infection, intoxication, neoplastic 
production, etc., poor prefoetal, foetal, and postf octal ali- 
mentation retain a preponderant influence. 

Before leaving this important question of laws of growth 
which must be present in your mind in the course of your 



116 Growth During School Age 

observation of the child and of your direction of education, 
I beheve I ought to give you a resume of them with concise 
formulations. 

RESUME 

I. LAWS RELATIVE TO THE ALTERNATIONS OF GROWTH 

1. Long bones grow in thickness and lengthen alternately 
and not simultaneously. The periods of repose in elonga- 
tion are utilized by the growth in thickness (1 and 3^), 
Plate X, D. 

2. The periods of activity and repose which succeed each 
other half-yearly in the increase in length of a long bone 
are opposite for two long bones consecutive in the same limb 
(1 and 3), Plate X, C and D. 

S, The half-year represents the average duration of al- 
ternation of a great number of increases ; thus a long bone 
grows in thickness during six months more than it length- 
ens ; then it lengthens during the following six months more 
than it grows in thickness. 

The great alternations evolve around puberty. (3.) 

4. Height owes the greatest part of its development, be- 
fore puberty to the lower limbs, after puberty to the bust 
(1 and 3), Plate X, A. 

5. The principal peripuberal increases in height are pro-^ 
duced during the two semesters which precede the dawn of 
puberty. The principal peripuberal increases of weight 
take place during the very semester of the dawn of puberty 
and during the two semesters which follow (1 and 3), Plate 
X, B. 

6. Growth is especially of the bones before puberty and 
above all of the muscles after puberty (1 and 3), Plate X, C. 

^ Figures refer to publications, p. 120. 



Some Laws of Growth 117 



II. LAWS RELATIVE TO PUBERTY 

The germen is the continuous axis of life around which 
gravitate, partially alternate, organization and disorgan- 
ization. 

1. Puberty is the key of growth. 

2. The debut of the shoot of the pubic hairs P^ precedes 
by three semesters on an average the dawn of puberty P^ A^. 

3. In the masculine sex, the debut of the shoot of the 
hairs in the arm-pits corresponds to the dawn of puberty 
(1). In the feminine sex, it appeared with a slight retarda- 
tion upon the first menstruation according to Dr. Martha 
Francillon. 

4. P^ A^ which mark the end of the puberal phase, occur 
four semesters approximately after P^ A^ (1 and 2). 

5. Twelve to seventeen years separate puberty from 
birth. This is the prepuberal period of growth. Two years 
suffice for its establishing and constitute the puberal period. 
Beyond that, three years are necessary to attain to nubility, 
three years which represent the duration of the post-puberal 
period of growth, or the inter-nubilo-puberal period (11). 

6. Puberty is precocious or delayed according to the 
value of placental alimentation (9 and 11). 

7. Puberty is the period of maturing of the organs of re- 
production; it answers to the maturity of the encephalon, 
but marks merely the debut of the last stage of the soma 
towards maturity (9), Plate IX. 

8. Puberty determines normally some inequalities of 
growth which have for object the definite appropriation of 
the soma to the function of reproduction, but they often 
carry with them some temporary troubles, not pathological. 
Such are the change of voice, the "vergetures" of growth, 



118 Growth During School Age 

such are a great number of other troubles which determine 
in the scholar some various ills by psychical repercussion 
(9 and 10). 

9. The duration of the effects of irregular puberal 
growth depends upon that of alternation of growth to which 
it is connected. If it is prolonged, it is that the action of 
a contingent cause preserves it from the law of alternation, 
and in this case, the troubles assume a pathological char- 
acter (9 and 10). 

10. Puberty has an inverse action on the pigment accord- 
ing as it concerns the pigment of the skin and hair which 
it darkens or of the pigment of the iris which it light- 
ens (1). 



III. LAWS RELATIVE TO THE PROPORTIONS DURING GROWTH 

Plates I, V, VI, VII, VIII and XVI. 

1. From the child just born until manhood is reached 
each segment has its own manner of behaving towards 
height (4). 

2. If the proportional growth is superior to that of stat- 
ure for one segment of the body, it is inferior to it for the 
segment situated immediately below or above (4 and 8). 

3. Such segment which progresses relatively more than 
the stature until puberty, falls behind beyond the age of 
puberty and vice versa (4 and 8). 

4. The proportions of breadth in general present some 
peculiar variations which are in correlation with those of 
the proportions of length of trunk (7 and 8). 

5. There are three phases in the evolution of the varia- 
tions presented by the proportions of length and breadth 
in the course of post-foetal ontogeny; the first phase ex- 



i 



Some Laws of Growth 119 

tends from birth to six years, the second from six to fifteen 
years, and the third from fifteen years to adult age (8). 

6. Some proportions determined for each category of the 
organic constitution answer to the puberal period and very 
often even to the dawn of puberty (11). 

7. The proportions consequently allow of an acquaint- 
ance, in a close manner, with the space of time which, at a 
given moment, separates a child from puberty, that is, his 
puberal age, his age of evolution (11). 

8. At six years, on an average, about nine years before 
puberty, the proportions are such during a semester or 
two that the silhouette of the child indicates that of the 
future man (4 and 8), Plate I and especially II and XVI, 



rV. LAWS RELATIVE TO ASYMMETRIES 

1. Between the binary organs a correlative asymmetry 
of hyperfunction governs ; in the right-handed, the right 
upper limb is longer and thicker, the right shoulder lower, 
etc., characteristics which pass to the left side in the left- 
handed (5). 

2. The evolution of normal asymmetries of binary organs 
and of the trunk progresses throughout age in a sense in- 
verse to growth, but in the same direction as function (5). 

3. In right-handed, the superiority of length and of thick- 
ness which is on the right side for the upper limbs, is often 
situated on the left side for the lower limbs, which fact 
determines a crossed functional superactivity. In the left- 
handed the crossing is reversed (5). 

4. The auricles of the ears show a notable and constant 
asymmetry without apparent functional correlation which 
growth tends to efface (5 and 6). 



120 Growth During School Age 

PUBLICATIONS IN WHICH THE FACTS LEADING 
TO THE LAWS ARE ANALYSED 

1. Recherches anthropometriques sur la croissance des di- 

verses parties du corps. 

2. De la puberte a la nubilite, Societe d'Anthropologie, 

7 juillet, 1909. 

3. Alternances des accroissements (semestriels) au cours 

du developpement du corps humain (dans le sexe mas- 
culin). Societe de Biologie, seance du 25 juin 1910. 

4. Les proportions du corps pendant la croissance. Soci- 

ete d'Anthropologie de Paris, 1910. 

5. Asymetries normales des organes hvnaires chez Vhomme. 

Academic des Sciences 1900 et 1910. 

6. A propos d'asymetrie auriculaire. Societe d'Anthropol- 

ogie de Paris, 1910. 

7. Variations des proportions de longueur et de largeur du 

corps dans le sexe masculin au cours de Vontogenie 
post-foetale. Academic des Sciences, 1911. 

8. Variations des proportions, — Leurs lois evolutives. 

Academic de Medecine, 1911. 

9. Essai d*explication du role de la puberte chez Vhomme. 

Societe d'Anthropologie de Paris, 1911. 

10. L^accroissement inegal a Vepoque de la puberte. Acad- 

emic des Sciences, 1912. 

11. De quelques rapports de revolution de croissance avec 

la puberte. XIV°^^ Congres d'Anthropologie (Ge- 
neve, 1912). 



PART II 

APPLICATIONS TO EDUCATION AND PEDAGOGY 

"... Vanatomie et la physiologie humaine, ont besoin 
de rhistoire de developpement de Vhomme apres comme avant 
sa naissance. La psychologic n'y est pas moins interessee. 
La medecine, Vhygiene et aussi la morale, Veducation 
physique et intellectuellei tout cela doit en beneficier par la 

mime, . . ." 

L. Manouvrier, 

{Preface des "Recherches sur la Croissance 

des diver ses parties du Corps^' de Paul 

Godin, p. 11), 



CHAPTER I 

UNEaUAL GROWTH IN THE SCHOIiAR. ORGANIC TROUBLES 

WHICH PROVOKE IT AND OF WHICH THE TEACHER 

AND EDUCATOR HAVE TO TAKE ACCOUNT 

Of what unequal growth consists. — Interest of education in 
the troubles which it determines. — Examples of puberal 
troubles due to unequal growth. — Pedagogical conse- 
quences of these troubles, 

OF what unequal growth consists. — ^We have just de- 
termined what we ought to understand by unequal 
growth: in an identical organ, the play of augmented and 
reduced growth creates some inequalities of the kind which 
have been observed in the first hours of life. 

In the embryo, these irregularities of growth had for ob-' 
ject the construction of the organs. In the child who is be- 
coming pubescent, the organs are formed; so the end of un- 
equal growth is no longer to achieve their perfection, to ren- 
der their functions more easy, and more in harmony with 
the new needs or at least the orientation quite different from 
the needs of the being soon capable of procreating. 

It is normal, in the child, that the progression of the ef- 
fects of unequal growth should last about one semester, a 
limited duration which leaves only in relatively rare cases, 
to the trouble outlined by non-parallel growth, the time to 
assume the importance of a pathological state. That arises 
from the effects of unequal growth not having escaped the 
law of alternation. However, there are some cases where 

123 



124 Growth During School Age 

the consequences of a poor placental alimentation, that 
which causes delayed puberty, suffice to preserve unequal 
growth temporarily from the law of alternation and to pro- 
long by one semester the progression of its effects. 

The functional equilibrium is from then on menaced. The 
physiological condition is still maintained if the anatomical 
constitution is not affected to the point of obstructing it 
too much and if the functional appropriation can be realized. 

However, the limits of the physiological state are even- 
tually found exceeded by the persistence of the inequality of 
growth ; from the moment when the functional appropriation 
can no longer take place without injury to the organism, 
the pathological state is very near to being created. This 
state proceeds, moreover, from the pathological condition 
from this fact, that it implies a lessening of the human ac- 
tivity, a reduction of resistance, from this fact, that, if it 
is established in a definitive way, it harms or arrests bal- 
anced growth, with the fine regulation of its proportions 
and, in the last analysis, determines a diminution of the 
chances of happiness of the individual and of his social 
worth. 

However, the limits of physiology are habitually exceeded 
only as often as an external cause intervenes, such as a trau- 
matism, an infection, a neoplasm, which cause several suc- 
cessive phases of alternation to be crossed without remission. 

Interest of education in the troubles due to unequal 
puberal growth. — It is conceived that the cases are numer- 
ous in which, while remaining at the limit at which physio- 
logical deviation is produced, without that there should be 
further morbid disorganization, some real troubles are 
nevertheless constituted. 

These are those ill-defined states which do not draw the 
attention of the family by any frankly unhealthy appear- 



Unequal Growth and Its Causes 125 

ance, of which no disquieting symptom provokes the calling 
of the physician, these are precisely those mixed states which 
interest the educator, and must be ferreted out by him; for 
between them and the psychic character of the scholar reigns 
a close union the forgetting of which ruins the psychology 
of the pubescent and is full of sad educational and peda- 
gogical consequences. 

Such is, in short, the pathogenetic mechanism of puberty 
which rests, as is seen, upon the physiological tripod; em- 
bryo-foetal nutrition, unequal growth, and the law of al- 
ternation. 

The factors which can eventually intervene are before all 
traumata, infections, and intoxication, these latter ordi- 
narily originating in the digestion and proceeding from poor 
alimentation of early age, that is, from everything which is 
not the nursing hy the mother, sole alimentation appropriate 
to the needs of the child and to the maintenance of its organs 
in a state of normal functioning. 

Puberal troubles from the side of the larynx and of the 
tegument. — In the larynx, in virtue of connective and mus- 
cular augmentations determined by puberty the thyro-ary- 
tenoidal ligaments and muscles suddenly elongate, and more 
than is suited to the space between their extreme points of 
insertion. 

Up to that time the cartilages have grown. At this mo- 
ment they cease to grow; or rather they reduce consider- 
ably the rate of their growth, so that the arytenoido-thy- 
roidal space is not proportional to the length of the con- 
nective-muscular elements of the vocal chords. At the end 
of a phase of alternation which can be extended to several 
semesters, the cartilages recover their activity of growth, 
the arytenoido-thyroidal digression is harmonized with the 
length of the chords. 



126 Growth During School Age 

The voice, at first shrill, then tremulous, takes on firm- 
ness at the same time that it realizes its definite tonal qual- 
ity and timbre. Emasculation maintains the shrill voice 
because it suppresses the germen, and as a result, puberty 
with all its consequences, with its augmentations bearing on 
the growth of connective and muscular tissue, with its dimi- 
nutions affecting among others the cartilaginous tissue. So 
that puberty being suppressed, everything which grows by 
the cartilage, continues to increase. The chords, on the 
contrary, remain stationary, and, throughout age, continue 
the chords of a child. They are too short for the greatly 
increased space which is between their extreme insertions. 

On the part of the skin, growth, it is known, is reduced 
or arrested when puberty approaches. The skin is, in fact, 
of ectodermic origin, and puberty reduces or arrests in the 
same way the growth of divers others derivatives of the 
ectoderm. 

If an infection occur and determine an exorbitant 
elongation of the long bones of the lower limbs, as is seen 
in the last stage of serious illness, the skin is not able to fol- 
low this increase. The infection acts like emasculation, in 
exaggerating the activity of the cartilage, in inhibiting the 
growth of connective and muscular tissues, in causing the 
phases of physiological alternation to transgress this ir- 
regular growth. 

The skin is stretched to such a point that its elastic ele- 
ments (Troisier and Menetrier) end in breaking themselves 
following one or several transversal lines above the knee- 
pan, and leave behind as a result one or several white bars 
called "vergetures de croissance," analogous to those which 
striate the abdominal teguments of women who have been 
pregnant several times. 

Puberal troubles on the part of the limbs. — We are 



Unequal Growth and Its Causes 127 

called to observe during the period of installation of puberty 
some muscular hernias by aponeurotic rupture, some myo- 
pathias by rupture of the muscular fibres. The stretching 
which determines these ruptures is the fact of unequal 
growth. A sudden lengthening of the long bones may cor- 
respond in the child, more or less maltreated during his in- 
tra-uterine life, to a repose of the growth of the muscles and 
connective tissue. 

That condition is often produced several semesters before 
the appearance of puberty. From thence come, in the seg- 
ments of the limbs, in the legs, in the thighs, a stretching of 
the muscles, of the nerve fibers, of the vessels, of the apo- 
neuroses, of the periosteum with some various accidents or 
merely painful sensations. They can be very vivid, the pains 
felt by the child ; they are ordinarily deep-seated, indistinct, 
without very precise localization* 

The instability of the child is the natural effect of it. It 
does not delay in reverberating on the psychical state of 
which the teacher cannot interpret the trouble if he is not ac- 
quainted with these special conditions of development. 

From the right or wrong interpretation of this instability 
can result the most grave consequences for the present and 
the future of the child. I have seen some scholars become 
bad subjects as a result of punishments incurred during this 
period for some reasons born of their sad tortures ; they 
were suffering and their sufferings were not understood. 
They were not able, in spite of the efforts of their young 
will to govern the need of changing the position of the pain- 
ful limbs. The agitation, evidently deplorable in class, was 
attributed to some causes of another order, as well for the 
good pupils "about to be spoiled," it was said, as for the 
bad. 

From everything difficult and confused which there was 



128 Growth During School Age 

for the child in his discomfort and his bewilderment of false 
human judgment, this impression stood out: "The punish- 
ment inflicted is unjust." 

"If I move all the time," exclaimed one of them, a good 
boy, choking with indignation, "Monsieur, I swear that it 
is not my fault." 

"It is an intolerable distraction," replied the master, made 
impatient by the unlucky influence of this disturber on the 
thirty-five other pupils in the class, and the punishment was 
maintained. 

Doubtless he was turbulent, this scholar, but whose duty 
was it to recognize the cause of his agitation .^ It cannot 
be a question of carrying into the domain of school the ir- 
responsibility which inhibits social selection while stifling the 
action of discipline and that of justice. It is a matter 
solely of distinguishing the physical condition of the child, 
and of recognizing with precision the cases liable to cor- 
rection and those which merit treatment. The educator 
and the physician must by their collaboration give satisfac- 
tion to this inalienable "right of the child," by enlightening 
themselves mutually on the conditions of growth. 

That gives you an idea of the importance of the educa- 
tive and pedagogical eff'ects of erroneous information rela- 
tive to the conditions which an organism in the travail of 
growth presents. 

In the bust, in the limbs, if skeletal elongation has been 
outstripped by that of muscular and connective tissue, a 
relaxation is produced, a kind of wavering. A part of the 
work of the contraction of the muscles is rendered ineffica- 
cious, and the eff*ort necessary to the act passes from single 
to twofold for an equal output, whence the rapid fatigue and 
its results. 

Let us note in passing that acquaintance with these di- 



Unequal Growth and Its Causes 129 

verse conditions is important to the psychologist as much 
as to the educator, and for reasons of the same order, 
namely, the interpretation of individuality. Judgment 
runs all the risks of being false if the existence of one of these 
conditions has not been ferreted out in the scholar before 
subjecting him to psychological experimentation. 

Troubles of puberty on the part of the vessels^ the viscera, 
the spinal column, the joi/nts. — The venous circulation is 
liable to arrest as a result of the relaxation of the walls of 
the return vessels which the muscles and aponeuroses of the 
limbs no longer support sufficiently. 

If the scholar sits on the flat of his thigh, as the high 
seats and the equilibrium of his body oblige him to do, it 
is at this moment that there is prepared the inception of 
varices which spread out a little later without that the im- 
mediate causes, at the time when they are detected, allow of 
an explanation of them. 

The serous folds, the suspensors of the viscera, lose their 
normal tension and what has just been said of varices holds 
true of visceral ptosis. It is often at puberty that visceral 
ptoses are initiated, or at least that they are set up ana- 
tomically. 

The spinal column is seen relaxed between two connective- 
muscular bundles, lending itself to accidental influences, 
school and otherwise, and bending itself while being twisted 
more or less as a result of the inequality of the lengthening 
-of the vertebral ligaments or in the direction of functional 
right, or left-handed demand, thus setting up a necessary 
scoliosis.-^ 

The articulations, on their side, take as a result of the re- 
laxation of the articulatory ligaments, a laxity singularly 

^Academy of Science, notes on the "Asymetries normales des organes 
binaires chez I'homme," February 19, 1900, and October 3, 1910. 



130 Growth During School Age 

favorable to Intra-articulatory traumatisms with friction, 
bruising, contusion of the cartilaginous or synovial surfaces, 
and consequently to arthralgia, to arthritis, independently 
of all special predispositions, to dislocations (subluxations), 
to serious temporary deformations of the multiarticular seg- 
ments such as the wrist and ankle. 

Puberal troubles through inordinate growth of segments 
of the spinal column. — Unequal growth can' injure two tis- 
sues of which the one serves for the gain of the other. Let 
us take for example the effects of unequal growth on the ver- 
tebral column and on the medullary nerve axis which it in- 
closes.^ 

Normally, puberal augmentation elongates the spinal col- 
umn. This fact has already been mentioned apropos 
puberal alternation in these terms : "height owes the great- 
est part of its development before puberty to the lower limbs, 
after puberty to the bust," to the spinal column, conse- 
quently, augmented by the height of the cranium. 

At the same time, the nervous tissues, centers and nerves 
which spring from it, nerve threads of the great sympa- 
thetic system itself, experience a reduction in their growth. 
So that the spinal cord, which needs, however, only a quite 
slight growth, by reason of its special relations with the 
vertebral column, does not succeed in realizing it. If the 
lengthening of the spinal column should be ever so little with 
a certain suddenness and attain important proportions, di- 
vers accidents can result from it. These accidents take a 
definite character when the increase bears exclusively on a 
single segment of the spinal column. The seat of predilec- 

^ Longueur relative de la moelle et du rachis," chapter xvi of VEttide 
8iir les rapports anthropomHriques en general, et sur les principales 
proportions du corps, of Professor L. Manouvrier, in Memoires de la 
Soci6t6 d' Anthropologic de Paris, v. II, 3e serie, 3e fascicule. 



Unequal Growth and Its Causes 131 

tion of this "local gigantism," of this exaggeration of length 
of segment, is the cervical spine of the child. 

The tension which the cervical segment of the spinal cord 
undergoes, having become too short by the fact, is transmit- 
ted to the brain, and there result from it some nervous mani- 
festations which can terminate in Sydenham's chorea, when 
the tension is moderate, when it reacts on the thalamus opti- 
cus and not beyond, and when the disparity of increase be- 
tween the spinal cord and spinal column is of short duration 
(phase of alternation). But these manifestations can go 
much farther, until to epilepsy, as observation and experi- 
mentation have demonstrated to me, if the effects of the 
tension are felt by the brain cells of the grey matter and if 
several phases of alternation are transgressed. 

Phenomena of this order appear in some children who 
show diverse accidents (such as traumatisms, infections, 
tapeworm — two personal observations — etc.), of a nature 
to favor for a longer or shorter time before the puberal pe- 
riod, unequal growth to which they are already disposed by 
the poor quality of placental alimentation. 

Choreic movements of puberal origin. — "Some disparities 
(disjonctions) of lesser importance are produced under the 
influence of causes less accentuated." That is quite frequent, 
and I especially call the attention of the educator to "the 
choreic movements" which are met in 6 to 9 scholars of every 
100 normal ones, and of which the greater part of the vol- 
untary muscles are o the seat, but especially the long mus- 
cles of the lower limbs and also those of the upper limbs. 
By reason of the circumstances disclosed by half-yearly ob- 
servation of the same children, I believe choreic movements 
ought to be connected with unequal growth. In each of 
the children affected with choreiform movements periodic 



13S Growth During School Age 

observation has disclosed unequal growth with transgres- 
sion of alternations; just as in scholars affected by tic- 
douloureux or facial neuralgia. But in these two groups, 
the manifestations of unequal growth were different. In the 
latter case they were of the cranium; in the other of the 
spine. In both, unequal growth multiplied its effects 
throughout the organism and often continued them several 
consecutive semesters. 

Do not confuse the tics which are local, contract singly 
such or such group of muscles, and determine some twitches 
continuously the same with choreic movements which are not 
localized and appear simultaneously at several points of the 
organism and assume neither the aspect nor the periodicity 
of tic. Nothing is easier, however, for the educator than 
this diagnosis ; for there is unfortunately no class where 
there are not found one or several children affected with the 
tics, or with something like it, with which it is possible to 
make a comparison. 

Choreic movements bring on some disturbance, a little 
like the pains of growth, but disturbance localized, in some 
fashion, and a disturbance which is not here provoked by 
pain ; it is the direct effect of the contractions, of muscu- 
lar twitchings, however reduced they may be. 

If the child has not been undressed, if the physician or 
the educator has not been able to see with his eyes the 
fibrillary contractions of the muscles, he does not and can- 
not know from what cause the physical instability arises 
and consequently the unsteadiness of the child who now finds 
himself exposed to the reproaches and perhaps to punish- 
ments, evidently unjust, since he is no more master of these 
little useless and often ill-timed movements than he would 
be of the large movements of Sydenham's chorea. 

I repeat, these "choreic movements" are much more fre- 



Unequal Growth and Its Causes 133 

quent in scholars than is imagined. Now, twelve years of 
teaching and thirty years of practice in medicine would have 
made me acquainted with nothing at all regarding them and 
their consequences if the examination of the stripped child 
had not presented to my eyes the vibratory trembling of 
the muscular bundles. 

The}^ are observed sometimes as early as the age of eleven 
or twelve years, but it is above all, in the neighborhood of 
the appearance of puberty that the "choreic movements" 
manifest themselves. I have never seen them degenerate 
into chora ; and on the other hand, they last longer than the 
plainly choreic manifestations. They are involuntary, pain- 
less, unconscious, can be neither arrested nor even limited 
by the subject. 

From the pedagogical point of view, I must appeal to 
the benevolence of the master and ask him to cut short, as 
often as his instruction and good order in hi& class will per- 
mit him, the school hours of immobility for every child suf- 
fering from choreic movements. It is understood that as 
soon as it appears, his case will be submitted to the physi- 
cian who, without subjecting the child to a discipline of 
which he has more need than ever, will have to orientate him 
in the desired direction by special hygiene. 

These diverse circumstances of the puberal life of the 
child would create, if one did not take pains to know them 
perfectly, a host of quasi irresponsibilities which would ren- 
der the mission of the educator terribly delicate. There are 
still other circumstances which it is also necessary to know 
very well for they represent just as many exact duties for 
the direction of education. 

Contagious tics of puberal origin. — Such is the case of the 
tics. One day in 1911 I was passing through a little town 
of the French Jura, when I saw coming trooping along a 



lS4i Growth During School Age 

school of girls. The pupils were numerous, many middle- 
sized and a few large. While walking, they were chatter- 
ing and accompanied their gossip with a mimicking, intense, 
exaggerated, and singularly jerky. They made grimaces or 
shook their heads affirmatively or negatively. And, more- 
over, the conversation, carried on in a high key, had no re- 
lation at all with the energetic signs of denial or affirma- 
tion. And the speculation of the girls continued to unfold, 
showing new heads shaken by these useless movements, al- 
ways the same. 

There was no doubt possible; this school was the victim 
of an epidemic of tic. I experienced some regret at not 
being able to set out in quest of the source of the epidemic, 
when, in her turn, the mistress passed, holding by the 
arm, a pupil of thirteen to fourteen years old. Both, with- 
out looking at each other, were making with their heads, 
movements more extended, more jerky than those of all of 
the rest of the young flock. There was the origin of the 
contagion. It was the mistress herself. I had the con- 
firmation of it. And in fact, her favorite pupil surpassed 
all her schoolmates and showed herself suffering in the same 
degree as the mistress whose jerkings she copied faithfully. 

Without doubt, the public authorities are right, a hun- 
dred times, in taking account before all, of the intellectual 
and moral worth of the masters whom they place over youth. 
But, by this example, which calls up many others, one can 
see how grave is the responsibility which rests on them when 
they do not protect the children which the families confide 
to them, against an avoidable contagion, according to the 
very expressive word of Brouardel. 

Nothing is so easy for a master who observes, as to grasp 
the door of entrance into his class of the tics and to specify 
this one or that one who has brought in the favorite move- 



Unequal Growth and lis Causes 135 

ments. The. pupil himself who has brought them in, it can 
often be assured, has taken them from a comrade in the home 
where he lives, from the court-yard or garden where he 
habitually plays. I knew a little girl who seemed to be the 
only person in her community to have the tics. A little 
later, I noticed in the street another child presenting the 
same tics, and I learned that these little girls passed each 
other twice a day in going to their respective courts. 

In a gathering in which girls retain their large bonnets, 
nothing is so comical as the agitation in every direction of 
this motley-colored mushroom bed where are distinguished 
some other hats shaken by the tics of the little human be- 
ings which they cover; and the thought of the infirmity ar- 
rests the impulse to laugh which the drollery of the sight 
had just provoked. 

Tic can be transient but it sometimes continues in the 
young man or the young girl; it can even persist through- 
out life. I know a brilliant general officer who has retained 
in his eyelids the tic of his infancy and young grandmoth- 
ers who still shake their heads as at fifteen years. 

My observations in some varied occupations have led me 
to consider the general prevalence of tic in the school-child, 
as an effect of contagion to which the child in travail of 
puberty is exposed, as a result of unequal growth which in- 
creases the gain of the cranium at the moment when the 
rate of growth of the nerves (reduced puberal growth) is 
reduced, and thus creates some mechanical causes of cere- 
bral excitation. Certain children who had not contracted 
the tic prevailing, professed regret at not being able "to 
do as the others." Tic at school becomes a fashion. 

Not all tics are contagious but I am speaking only of 
contagious ones because their relations to puberty are ex- 
ceedingly close, since they are connected with unequal 



136 Growth During School Age 

growth. Masters have every facility to make out the con- 
tagion and its origin, a thing which is not always within 
reach of the physician not called to share the life of the 
child. 

As to original cases, cases which are the point of depar- 
ture of the contagion, they arise from the nervous pathology 
of the adult who is outside our field. 

Onanism of puberal origin. — When onanism becomes a 
menace to health, it ordinarily arises from pathological 
causes ; but there are some cases where it derives from mani- 
fest effects of unequal para-puberal growth. It is under 
this head only that it is under consideration. 

As for the headache of growth and for the tic, the dis- 
turbing cases of onanism that I have known of in the schools 
and in families, touched some subjects somewhat removed 
from their puberty. Periodical examination caused me to 
verify in most cases the absence of a local provocatory cause 
but a sudden augmentation of cranial dimensions. Now, 
this augmentation arose in some children of moderate in- 
telligence, by no means overdriven, at the moment when 
puberal preparation reduces or arrests the growth of nerv- 
ous tissue. The abruptness of the augmentation of volume 
of the cranium denoted the intervention of unequal puberal 
growth. The other causes eliminated, I believed I was able 
to connect onanism to this mechanical cause of psychical 
trouble. Appropriate regulations of physical exercises, a 
varied intellectual culture, select and notably more inten- 
sive ; the suppression of all alcoholic drink, the treatment 
which I instituted for unequal growth, — ^by these means I 
obtained in a few months a change of aspect of the general 
condition of these subjects which implied the effective cor- 
rection of the "psychical deviation." But, outside of these 



Unequal Growth and Its Causes 137 

cases coincident with puberty, inveterate onanism is always 
a malady which has an unhealthy setting. 

Let us then turn the patient over to the physician, and 
let us, as educators, charge ourselves with the search of the 
causes springing from the moral atmosphere, from the en- 
vironment, from comrades, from friend, from readings. 
Then, according to the results of this double inquiry, let 
the direction of education be orientated with firmness. 

In all cases, the educator needs great skill. He will be 
severe in the choice of relations and will ruthlessly turn away 
the dangerous example; he will exercise a loyal surveillance, 
and will attempt to inspire confidence in the subject ren- 
dered distrustful by his very vice. 

With some, the educator will be able to reason, while re- 
fraining from all exaggeration relative to the evil or to its 
consequences. He will have constant regard of truth, and 
will never forget that the physiological truth is the whole- 
some education, the wholesome example, the moral clean- 
ness of the air which the child breathes. Such is the physi- 
ological truth because such is the safeguard of the chronol- 
ogy of functions. 

These are the reasons why, from whatever side one re- 
gards it, the above-mentioned deviation is a resultant and 
arises above all from the first education which penetrates the 
child under cover of breeding. There is very little onanism 
among children nourished and reared by their mother. 



CHAPTER II 

GROWTHS BY GREAT ALTERNATIONS. WHAT THE EDUCATOR 
AND TEACHER CAN INFER FROM IT 

Alternate rhythm of growth for the spinal column and for 
the cranium. — Alternations in the development of the 
germen. — Relative independence of the evolution of 
growth to great alternations. — Relations between them 
and with puberty. — Pedagogical and educational de- 
ductions, 

ALTERNATE rhythm of growth for the spinal column 
and for the cranium. — Alternation is a synonym for us 
of the succession of repose to effort, and of effort to repose 
in the growth of an organ. I refer to relative repose, of 
course. We were acquainted with the short alternations or 
at least with a certain number of them; we now mean those 
which extend over several years. The growth of the spinal 
column is of this number. Its alternations are of long 
duration. Very active in the course of the intra-uterine life, 
it diminishes from birth to puberty, to the point of attain- 
ing at that moment, its slightest proportional length. 

As early as the appearance of puberty, the spinal col- 
umn again begins to elongate so as to contribute from now 
on more than the lower limbs to the elongation of the stature 
and that continues until the adult state is completed. 
Plate III. 

The cranium offers another example of great alterna- 

138 



Growths hy Great Alternations 139 

tion of growth. It expands in every direction in the foetus 
and presents already at birth 30/100 of the volume which 
it will have once an adult. Plate IX. Its growth under- 
goes no arrest at all in the well built child, and continues 
actively until about the age of five years when 80/100 of 
its final volume is attained. Beyond the age of five years, 
the growth of the cranium acquires in ten years the 20/100 
of the increase which will permit it to be adult at puberty. 

The rests of alternation are not marked by any arrests, 
either for the cranium or for the spinal column, but only 
by some diminishing of the activity of growth. The cra- 
nium attains the adult state at puberty approximately, 
and, although its activity of growth has been continued, it 
is shown to be very irregular, taking nine months to realize 
the first third of its final volume, then five years to acquire 
the second third, approximately, finally ten years to make 
up the remaining third. 

Alternation in the develor- rA of the germen. — But the 
alternation of the evolution of the germen is much the more 
accentuated. Its development, that of the seminal issue, 
is made during the intra-uterine life except the last stage, 
which consists in the ultimate modification of the spermatid 
into spermatozoon. This final transformation is equal to 
the last part of the growth of the germen. The transforma- 
tion will be effected at the time of puberty, a time of which 
it decides, since it is the essential phenomena of the trans- 
formation. Plat§ IX. During the whole period which ex- 
tends from birth to puberty, the repose of the germen is 
complete. 

Relative independence of the evolutions of growth to the 
great alternations. — The three organic factors are consid- 
ered here, the germen according to anatomical and func- 



140 Growth During School Age 

tional notions, G, the brain according to the volume of the 
cranium, C, the soma according to the volume of the trunk, 
V (see p. 222). 

Their comparative evolution presents to be considered 
(a) the modality of the development and (b) the relative 
rate of this development. Plate IX. 

(a) Modality of development. — The germen is developed 
in two leaps with an interval between, the one uterine, the 
other puberal. The brain is developed in two successive 
leaps, the one before birth, the other soon after. The soma 
is developed without making any leap, from the germ to the 
adult. 

(b) Relative rate of development, — At birth, the germen 
attains already to a near point, about 95/100 of its total 
development. The brain attains 30/100 of its total devel- 
opment. The soma (trunk) realizes only 6/100 of its adult 
state. Plate IX. 

At five years the germen £3 ctationary. The brain attains 
to 80/100 of its adult state. The soma still represents 
only 30/100 of the adult soma. 

At 15% years, the germen is adult. 

At 15% years, the brain is adult. 

At 15% years, the soma is not yet adult. 

Such is, in the course of growth, the manner of behavior 
of the three great organic components of life. It can be 
translated thus from the point of view of its educative con- 
sequences. "The transformer-distributor (soma) of the 
elements of nutrition is developed with regularity in the 
healthy child, from the germ to adult age, the age which is 
determined by the very achievement of its growth. 

The soma is outstripped by the germen and by the brain 
which are adults from the time of puberty. Now, while 
the perfected soma is an important condition of the best 



Growths hy Great Alternations 141 

germinal function, it is only a secondary condition of the 
best cerebral function. 

On the morrow of puberty psychical activity will then not 
at all escape an educative direction which will hav^, prepared 
this post-puberal period, but this direction will have to take 
the greatest account of the germinal maturity which is not 
the functional maturity, since a condition of great impor- 
tance still is missing, but which is found at every instant 
solicited by the trend itself of psychical culture. 

Before puberty, in the course of agenital life, psychical 
activity is entirely free. The cerebral function is in readi- 
ness, since somatic perfection is not a functional condition 
for the brain, since the immature germen lies dormant, since 
finally, the brain is in possession of all its cellules, which 
have no more to do than to be hypertrophied, that is, de- 
veloped to an unusual degree. 

It depends upon education whether cerebral hypertrophy 
becomes a riches or a poverty, a benefit or a menace for so- 
ciety as for the individual. To leave this work of hyper- 
trophy to be effected unrestrainedly, is to abandon the cere- 
bral "furniture" (ameublement) to the street, to the educa- 
tional carelessness of society, which accumulates hideous ex- 
amples with a monstrous blindness of will. 

Education is entirely responsible for the worth of the 
cerebral acquisitions of the whole period of infancy. Dur- 
ing this period of "agenital life" the influence of the germen 
makes itself felt somatically or cerebrally, only in the anor- 
mal, and, at least for the pathological state, it is of educa- 
tion that it is necessary to demand account for any de- 
viation. 



CHAPTER III 

VARIOUS PEDAGOGICAL APPLICATIONS 

Pubescents and non-puhe scents. — Their somatic and psychi- 
cal differences. Pedagogical deductions. — **Educative 
movement'' of each organ. — Deference to the law of al- 
ternation. — Growth and intelligence. — Position of 
scholar in schoolroom, necessity of varying it. 

PUBESCENTS and non-puhescents.— The life of the 
child, until his transformation into an adult, forms 
two parts with puberty as the center. The child is pre- 
puberal or he is post-puberal, if one may thus express him- 
self, and more simply, the child, the scholar, is pubescent or 
he is not, the puberal period itself being only a point around 
which gravitate the disclosing transformations, which tend 
towards the desirable perfections for the integral conserva- 
tion of the race. 

Prepuberal, that is the child. Post-puberal, that is the 
youth. The child continues to grow into the youth, but 
we know what profound differences mark this second part 
of development. 

This fact is capital for the educator and explains for 
him the different fate of the same procedures in regard to 
the same child at these two periods, or in regard to schol- 
ars of whom, although of near ages, some are pubescent and 
others are non-pubescent. 

Somatic and psychical difference between pubescents and 
non-pubescent s. — Their bodies are at different degrees of de- 

142 



Various Pedagogical Applications 143 

velopment which their proportions express clearly. Their 
brains may be very much alike, if their education and their 
culture have been the same ; but the brain of the non-pubes- 
cent is free; the brain of the pubescent is under the influ- 
ences of the conjunctive proliferation of puberty and of the 
germen. 

Outside of these cerebral conditions and outside of the 
mentality which ensues, the phenomena of augmentation, of 
reduction or of arrest, of total growth or of involution, af- 
firm this distinction between the prepubescent and the post- 
pubescent. The special pathological and para-pathological 
troubles of puberty complete the establishing of the dif- 
ference. 

Let us understand thoroughly: "special pathology" does 
not signify here all the affections to which the puberal pe- 
riod is exposed. By special puberal pathology, it is neces- 
sary to understand the troubles provoked by the very es- 
sence of the phenomenon of puberty; those which are pro- 
duced only at the moment of puberty, around it and because 
of it. The troubles which constitute the special pathology 
of puberty, are, in proper terms, the deviations from the 
physiological condition which result from irregular growth 
and from poor placental nutrition, just as, in a large meas- 
ure, of the alimentation of the year which follows birth. 

The non-pubescent is a lad who is separated by a greater 
or less number of years from the adult state ; the pubescent 
is a youth who is at a precise distance from his nubility, who 
•will be an adult in five years, if he is beginning his puberty, 
in four years if it has appeared the preceding year, in three 
if the dawn of puberty dates two years back in him. This 
youth is only seventeen years old, and he is already an adult 
because he has been pubescent from the age of twelve years, 
as in the case cited above of the twins of which one, not yet 



144 Growth During School Age 

pubescent, will be nubile at the earliest at twenty-two years. 

Pedagogical deductions. — You will indeed foresee that the 
process of education or instruction suitable for one is in 
no way appropriate to the other. According to that, you 
will comprehend further, that, excepting the family fire- 
side, boys so different as pubescent and non-pubescent are, 
cannot dwell together, share the same life, exchange ideas 
without harm for the non-pubescents who will not delay imi- 
tating the pubescents in all their doings and acts ; this will 
be injurious to both, but it offers for the non-pubescents a 
veritable danger. From that source spring disorders too 
often irreparable. 

Recall what puberal alternation of organic growth has 
taught us. The brain which possesses the cellules which it 
had already since birth, cellules which it has not at all re- 
newed, of which it has not increased the number but only 
the dimensions, the brain is going to become adult at the 
time when puberty dawns ; it will lock up in its gangue hence- 
forth inextensible, the instruction gathered earlier ; it will 
graft the new notions on the earlier acquisitions ; all cerebral 
elaboration will bear, more or less apparent, more or less dis- 
simulated, the imprint of the instruction and of the education 
received up to that time. 

Before puberty you have had the field open to all culture, 
but also to all imitation, to rapid and precise assimilation. 
Look to the examples, and, if unfortunately the family has 
not taken this care before you, educators, apply yourselves 
at the earliest poss^ jle time to the task of correcting the 
moral and psychological deformities and do your best, but 
do not hope to efface anything whatever. Hasten ^ o utilize 
the prepuberal liberty of the child's mind, for tomorrow, 
dominated by the triumphant germen, he will become clumsy 



Various Pedagogical Applications 145 

and subject to fatigue, almost closed in the domains where 
he was the most open. 

Happy if your sowing has been done with tact, with dis- 
cernment, if the examples with which the senses have fur- 
nished the brain are all stamped in the coin of a pure moral- 
ity. For, no one can count on taking away from the cere- 
bral museum the image of an evil act, the immoral scene 
which an imprudence has suspended there in past time. It 
remains there and its recall can carry along with it the 
worst consequences to remote repercussions. Puberty will 
soon be initiated, and the youth will make you pay dear 
for your errors towards the child, for your forgetfulness, 
your negligence. 

There is an educative moment for each organ. — Each or- 
^an, according to its development and its possibilities has its 
"educative moment," a moment more or less extended in 
time, but in which the organ will really offer an excellent 
state of educative receptivity, if one has taken care to pre- 
pare it. Thus the moment for the brain is prepuberal by 
the motives which we know. It begins at the early hour 
when the senses commence to inform the brain. ^ 

It belongs to the educator to conform his orientation, 
to adapt his method to what he can discover from the indi- 
viduality of the little child. Individuality exists. It is a 
question of knowing how to discover it. To the educator 
comes the appreciation of the dosage of notions, but above 
all of their choice. For the lessons here are all made up of 
example, of manner of living, of evenness of humor, of firm 
and gentle will, of order, of regularity in duties ; they are 
made of images, of those very ones which are hung on the 
walls of the chamber, forming the habitual horizon of the 
child. 



146 Growth During School Age 

Prepared since the first hours of understanding, the di- 
rection will be excellently done and more and more easy. 
Doubtless, in course of the years which constitute the second 
period of evolution, from six to about fifteen years, by the 
side of the useful provisions there are also made the useless 
and the dangerous, and that, in spite of the educator who, 
however, will be able to overtake, at an advantageous time, 
the fleeing personality of his pupil, if he has been informed 
accurately on it by some periodical examinations, by a 
methodical and wise observation. 

It is clear that an educator warned in this way, will not 
follow, in order to reach the citadel of the child whom he 
directs, any paths whatsoever, but those which the notions 
acquired on the individuality of the child mark out for him. 
He will have to conduct himself according to the knowledge 
of his temperament, otherwise expressed, of the share of 
energy of which he disposes, and of the fashion in which 
he dispenses it, of the rapidity or the slowness with which 
he recuperates and of the time which he needs for this re- 
cuperation. He will guide himself by the relation between 
the duration of effort and the duration of recuperative re- 
pose, - (see the individual formula), 
e 

Deference to the law of alternation. — You cannot give 
yourself an idea of the influence on the present and future 
organic functioning, of the deference or of the transgression 
of a phase of repose after a phase of effort. The organic 
alternations of activity and of repose are applied to all the 
manifestations of the life of the child as to his growth. It 
is imposed on the speedy as on the slow ; the former succeeds, 
nevertheless, to lengthen temporarily the phase of activity 
at the expense of the phase of repose. 

Transgression of the natural alternation of the individual 



Various Pedagogical Applications 147 

leads to an organic unbalancing for a short time, or for a 
longer time (jading) according to the individual resources; 
in those who resist, thanks to the riches of their resources, 
it happens that later an organ causes them to feel that 
there is suffering for it (heart, brain, digestive apparatus), 
or that the advantageous effects sought for by impulse do 
not subsist. 

Alternation and intellectual growth. — In the intellectual 
order, the effects of transgression of alternation are not bet- 
ter. The teacher has the greatest interest in causing this 
law of nature to be respected by all; the application of it 
to scholars demands, nevertheless, skill and a perfect knowl- 
edge of their individuality, the phases of work and of repose 
varying their relative duration with each one. 

But this application of the law of somatic alternation 
to cerebral activity is, for the instant, outside of our do- 
main. It represents one of the aspects of the relation of 
growth with intelligence, it is true; and this chapter which 
comprises the relations of the growth of the brain with its 
psychical manifestations on the one hand and with the 
growth of the soma on the other, which makes a study of 
the various influences on cerebral development of the factors 
capable of accelerating it, of retarding it, of arresting it, 
and their repercussion on the intelligence, could be made the 
object of a study which would henceforth have a solidly 
established somatic basis. 

Moreover, you will find matter for reflection on this 
subject in the elements met with in the course of the chap- 
ters which precede. I call your attention specially to the 
augmentations by great alternations of the brain, of the 
soma, and of the germen (Part II, Chap. II), to the possible 
consequences of irregular growth of puberty, which can 
harm the growth of the cranium in function of that of the 



148 Growth During School Age 

'brain, as it harms that of the spinal chord in function of 
that of the spinal colum (Part II, Chap. I). I point out 
to you again the law of alternation (pp. 106 and 116), tem- 
perament, etc. 

Position of the scholar in the schoolroom; necessity of 
varying it. — In the schoolroom, the respect of the law of al- 
ternation interests simultaneously the body and the mind 
of the child. One of its modalities is formulated in these 
terms: The sitting posture of the pupil is not a position 
of repose; the pupil is required to maintain it a long time 
in immobility, and his reactions show the ill effects of it. 

Whatever be the excellence of the combination desk-seat, 
and we shall see further on that it is far from being excel- 
lent, immobility in a fixed posture rather soon becomes a tor- 
ment for the child, and degenerates into suffering if it is 
prolonged further. The torment is already manifested by 
the frequent displacing of the limbs, and of the trunk; it 
also exerts an influence on attention. The suffering dis- 
turbs the physical and intellectual normality of the child, 
it places the normal state in danger if it lasts too long and 
in this case acts injuriously on his moral condition. 

There are only two positions of repose for man, — the 
lying position and squatting position (to squat down, to 
sit on one's heels. Old women squat near the fire).^ This 
latter posture is also that of the baby playing in the sand, 
that of the scholar playing at marbles, that of the Arab on 
the public square. At souk and at the coffee-house, the 
Arab crosses his folded-up legs and takes another posture 
which is the position seated on the ground, analogous to 
that of tailors formerly on their wide taljle without a sup- 
port for the back, 

1 Littre. 



Various Pedagogical Applications 149 

There is relative repose for the body only in some pos- 
tures approaching more or less these two positions. The 
sitting position is intermediate to the lying and the squatting 
position. It partakes of both, and more of the one than 
of the other according to the elevation of the seat or the 
inclination of the back; but it is neither one nor the other 
and gives no repose if it is not modified in the direction of 
the squatting position or in the direction of the reclining 
position. 

It is this latter which a person seated on a free seat seeks 
when he has no fixed point of support for his feet and lifts 
the forward part of his chair, throwing himself back and 
so approaching a horizontal position. The scholar corrects 
in the same way the sitting posture when he lets himself 
slide down on his chair until his hip-bones correspond to the 
edge of the seat, his body describing a strong curve at 
lumbo-dorso-cervical convexity in order to allow its superior 
part to assume the direction of the back. The child is then 
said to be "seated on his back" by his parents and his 
teacher who oppose this position without success. 

If the disposition of the seat in relation to the desk, its 
fixity, the existence of a back almost vertical, do not leave 
to the child the liberty of "sitting on his back," he does not 
delay placing himself obliquely on his rigid chair, and thus 
enables himself to correct in the direction of the squatting 
position the disadvantages of the angular posture which the 
furniture imposes on him so that one might call "ortho- 
stat," the right angle prevaling at the point of the bi-coty- 
loid axis of the femur and of the axis of the knees ; his body, 
abandoning the fatiguing rectitude, inclines forward, sinks 
down, in some fashion, forming a posterior convexity of 
the vertebral column (hyphosis) which, through the clothes. 



150 Growth During School Age 

appears uniform and greatly curved. On the child stripped, 
one observes ^ at the level of the lumbar region, a promi- 
nence, a veritable hump which is recognized by the spiny 
processes of the third and fourth lumbar vertebrae, and to 
which corresponds, in front, a ventral concavity more or less 
angular whose summit is formed by a furrow-like depression 
passing through the navel or doubling itself into two folds 
of which the one rests above, the other below the navel 
scar. 

It happens frequently that the spinal curvature assumes 
the aspect of a fracture of the column at the level of the 
prominence of the spinal process (apophysis), above which 
the column forms almost a straight line, inclined from bot- 
tom to top and from behind forward, while below it, the 
lumbro-sacral portion remains in a vertical plane. 

It is necessary that the child feel a quite imperious need 
of repose to resort to this mixed posture, which is still a 
fatigue, because it represents only the rude outline of a 
position of repose and has no other advantage than to re- 
lax certain groups of muscles and to displace a trifle the 
place of pressure. 

Either the school furniture suppresses the fatigue of the 
sitting posture and removes thus for the scholar all cause 
of seeking a position of repose ; or else the school furniture 
does not suppress the fatigue and then it incurs a heavy 
responsibility in fettering all the positions of repose, and 
exposes under this head the scholar to the known effects 
of daily repeated fatigue. 

The remedy is precise and simple: the child must be able 

to vary his position in the course of stud3'ing, in the course 

of the recitation; he must be enabled to stand up and be 

seated alternately. The duration of tlie sitting posture 

'Dr. P. Godin. L'attitude scolaire: I'Educateur moderne, 1906. 



Various Pedagogical Applications 151 

is indicated by the approach of fatigue. In virtue of the 
law of alternation, it is of interest to avoid everything which 
could cause a transgression of the phases of alternation, a 
transgression which is injurious for the harmony of the 
body and which can carry with it a state of illness. Fatigue 
which is itself born of transgression by too prolonged ef- 
fort of several phases of repose, implies, once acquired, a 
transgression of several phases of effort and puts a check 
on individual activity. 

In kind, fatigue appeared on an average in the classes 
where I have observed and experimented, at the end of 35 
to 45 minutes. One should then cause the position to be 
varied from half hour to half hour. That makes a single 
change of position in the course of a recitation of one hour. 

When the furniture of Feret, of Mauchin of Geneva, of 
Schindler, even that of Kottman, the optostat of Dr. Holland 
•of Toulouse, that of Brudenne will be anatomically individu- 
alized according to the simple method which I propose, it 
can be utilized with the greatest advantage, because it facili- 
tates this change of station without trouble for instruction. 
But it is unusable so long as it is not anatomically indi- 
vidualized. 

Once the seat is suitably low there will be left to the legs 
a freedom of which the muscles and the circulation will 
have benefited. The erect position will perfect the realiza- 
tion of this beneficent action which will be translated, as 
experimentation has demonstrated to me, by the substitution 
of the "euryplastic" for the "macroplastic," by the increase 
in girth of the lower limbs, in a more just proportion with 
the growth in length. And one will see fewer and fewer of 
those poor collegians, "waders," awkward on their too long 
legs, easily fatigued, a soil too well prepared for all bacil- 
lary graftings. 



CHAPTER IV 

INDIVIDUALIZATION OF SCHOOL FURNITUEE 

It is "seated'^ and not '^standing'* that the scholar makes use 
of it. — Error resulting from the measure of the schol- 
ar's height standing taken as guide in the assigning of a 
seat. — Height standing and height sitting. — Anatom- 
ical and physiological conditions which must govern the 
choice of individual furniture. — Simple means of con- 
forming to it. — Working manual. 

IT is seated and not standing that the scholar makes use 
of it. — As it is not within the ability of all teachers to 
have the position varied in the course of school time, and be- 
sides as all the instruction does not allow of changes of posi- 
tion, I have attempted to establish between the child and« 
the furniture which is destined for him, a relation as close 
as possible, to "individualize" school furniture, and I have 
made it the subject of a long communication to the con- 
gress of the Societes Savantes in 1912 at Paris. 

What is "individualization" of school furniture? It is 
simply adapting it to the child, to the very one who is des- 
tined to make use of it. This adaptation can be made only 
in so far as one takes for guide the anatomy and the physi- 
ology of the child in their relations with the sitting posture, 
a fact which has not been sufficiently taken into considera- 
tion up to the present time. 

It is indicated, in the first place, that the desk be adapted 
to the real proportions of the individual^ such as they are 

152 



n 



Individualization of School Furniture 153 

presented in the sitting posture. It is indispensable that 
this anatomical adapation subsist throughout the changes 
brought to the proportions of the body by growth. 

Up to the present, and that in the whole world, it is 
stature, that is, the height of the individual in the standing 
position, which has been taken for guide and for regulation 
of all the classifications of school furniture : in England the 
bi-personal system of Moss offers five sizes. The "single 
desk" of the United States takes account of eight different 
sizes. Switzerland, according to the dimensions of Guil- 
laume, accepts eight sizes also. The Belgian Council of 
Hygiene makes twelve categories according to size. M. 
Greard reduced to three the number of sizes according to 
which desks must be constructed. And it is also size which 
served as guide for the studies of the School Commission of 
Hygiene. The latest Congresses relative to the questions 
of hygiene in schools have formulated no protest at all 
against this method. And when Cardot, Bagnaux, Fahrner 
lay claim to some multiple measures, they see them only as 
complements of the factor height. The optostat of Dr. 
Rolland answers to three sizes. 

Errors resulting from the measure of the scholar s height 
standing taken as guide in the assigning of a seat. — Height 
standing and height sitting. — Very precise knowledge of the 
"P: portions du Corps," ^ of their variations from one in- 
divi jal to another, of their variations in the same individual 
in travail of growth from one age to another, leave no doubt 
at all on the absence of fixed correlations between stature 
and the reciprocal relations of the segments which enter into 
the constitution. 

^Prof. L. Manouvrier. Etudes sur les rapports anthropometriques en 
general et sur les principales proportions du corps. 

Dr. Paul Godin. Les "Proportions du corps pendant la Croissance." 
Bulletin de la Society d'Anthropologie de Paris. Paris, Maloine. 



154i Growth During School Age 

Let us content ourselves, for example, to consider the two 
great segments, the lower limbs and the bust. By bust, we 
know, is understood everything which rises above the plane 
of the seat of the individual seated. The relation of the 
limbs S to the bust B is only exceptionally the same in two 
boys of the same height, and, as a necessary corollary, two 
individuals of equal height in a standing position become 
of unequal height as soon as they are seated on the same 
bench. Plate XI. 

This fact, so easy to verify, suffices to show to what errors 
the systematic utilization of height can lead when it is a 
matter of adapting individually a piece of furniture which 
the child will use only to seat himself. If, in fact, with 
Feret, Mauchin, Schindler, Kottmann, Brudenne, it is de- 
sired to adapt a piece of furniture for sitting to a stand- 
ing position, it must undergo a veritable transformation 
which carries with it a complicated mechanism. 

Here is a graph which gives an idea of what becomes of 
the line of the heads in ten children of thirteen years of age 
and in ten boys of seventeen years of age according as they 
are standing or seated. Plate XI. Erect, it is a straight 
horizontal line ; seated, it is a line broken in accordion bel- 
lows, as M. L. Manouvrier has demonstrated. 

S 
The relation ^- , relation of bust (B) to lower limbs (S) 

governs over the relation of height between the plane of the 
seat and the plane of the desk top. The distance between 

T» 

these two planes is a result of the value of the relation ^. 

and it would be indispensable to calculate this relation if it 
were not found implied in the determination of the fixed 
distance from the desk top to the eyes. 

Anatomical conditions which must govern the choice of 



Individualization of School Furniture 155 

individual furniture. — We must deduce from what precedes : 
1. that the size cannot serve as regulation for classification 
of desks ; 2. that two factors are substituted for this unique 
factor, the limbs and the bust; 3. that each of them con- 
cerns distinctly one of the elements of the furniture, the 
limbs in front to guide in the determination of the height 
of the bench, and the bust alone being capable of dictating 
the difference between the seat and the desk top. 

So the constructor will have to build some desks separable 
from their seats, any desk whatever capable of being asso- 
ciated with any bench whatever of the model accepted, the 
joining and separating (by nuts, for example), capable of 
being effected with equal facility and rapidity. A high desk 
will be joined to a low seat and vice versa, following need. 
The high desk to a low seat will correspond to a long bust 
supported by short pelvic members. A seat relatively high, 
associated with a desk whose top is relatively low, in this 
sense that its plane is near that of the bench, will be adapted 
to a scholar of a wholly different structure (macroskeletal), 
although, perhaps, of equal size, with short bust and long 
legs. If we name the first of these two scholars X and the 
second Y, the furniture for X cannot be used by Y, and vice 
versa, except at the price of discomfort, of suffering per- 
haps, and, in any case, to the great damage of regularity 
of development and of capacity for work. 

In the course of growth, the respective proportions of 
X and Y can remain the same, but one must rather expect 

that each of them will see modified his relation ^— which, 

S 

very generally, will be shown different according as it will 

be considered in the same adolescent, before or after ^ 

^Dr. Paul Godin. Alternmices cles accroissements au cours du devel- 
oppement du corps humain. Societe de Biologic, seance du 25 juin 1910, 
t. LXVIIL p. 119. 



156 Growth During School Age 

puberty. It is because in reality height owes the greatest 
part of its development, before puberty to the lower limbs, 
after puberty, to the bust, as we established it in studying 
the laws of puberal alternation. Plate X, A. There will 
then be cause for repeating the work of adaptation of desks 
every semester, every year at least. 

Physiological conditions which must govern the choice of 
individual furniture. Simple means of conforming to it. — 
Let us now examine the physiological principles upon which 
individual adaptation must rest. 

(a) The child, the scholar needs to be seated relatively 
low. 

Every fatigued person seeks rest on a low seat, a seat 
whose edge and plane compress at no point whatever the 
whole part adjacent to the knee on the posterior side of the 
thigh. This pressure, to which no one gives heed, is an 
actual cause of discomfort which produces in the scholar 
in school time frequent removal of the lower limbs, attrib- 
uted too exclusivel}^ to the "need of movement" of children. 
In the long run, the compression of the posterior side of the 
thigh in its inferior third especially, determines some cir- 
culatory, nutritive, and nervous troubles, and contributes to 
the thickness of the shape of the leg compared to that of the 
Arab's legs, for example ; it causes in many adolescents a 
tendency to fatigue in their lower limbs of which the reason 
is sought elsewhere, or for which they are reproached as 
pretext for laziness. Now, a seat suitably low, adapted to 
the height of the leg of the subject {without taking the 
slightest account of his height) avoids this disadvantage. 
The suitable height is furnished by the culminating point 
of the anterior tubercle (tuberosity) of the tibia, so visible 
on the bare leg of the child, especially of the profile. 

(b) The scholar must be able to distinguish on the desk 



Individualization of School Furniture 157 

written and printed characters without havmg to lean for- 
ward, either with the head or the cervico-dorsal spine. 

The distance of 35 centimeters between the desk and the 
eye is necessary and sufficient. Every child with normal sight 
(emmetropia) or rendered such by corrective glasses, will 
distinguish clearly the written or printed text, as well as 
the contour of the letters traced by the point of his pen, if 
the binocular plane is at 35 centimeters from the point of 
the desk where his pen is writing. It is advisable then that 
this distance be reckoned between the binocular line and 
the center of the desk. 

In general, the inclination will be less for short busts for 
the macroskele (Manouvrier) ; it will be more accentuated 
for the long bust (brachyskele). This difference answers to 
some different correlative proportions of the length of the 
bust in these two groups ; it has for aim to assure the 
natural support of the forearm on the top of the desk with- 
out elevation or lowering of the shoulder, condition of the 
third physiological principle (c) of individual adaptation. 

Such are the notions which, in point of view of individual- 
ization, must complete the general rules touching "zero dis- 
tance," the approved width for the desk, furniture with a 
single seat. 

A consequence of the physiological reasons which demand 
the low seat, is, besides the foot-rest, the existence of a 
floor, of a surface extending under the seat like under the 
desk which the scholar can touch with both his feet in diverse 
positions which his legs take spontaneously. Another con- 
sequence is the adoption of a back such as Dr. Dufestal 
demands in his school hygiene,^ "a back slightly inclined and 
rising to the shoulderblades." 

In resume we desire a bench with a seat in horizontal 

"Paris, O. Doin, edit., 1910, p. 76. 



158 Growth During School Age 

plane, corresponding to the level of the anterior tibial cul- 
men of the child which must sit there, and supplied with a 
back slightly inclined and rising to the shoulderblades ; the 
width of the seat will be equal to its height. Desk top in- 
clined more for the long busts (great "difference") and less 
for the short busts (little "difference"), the center of each 
desk surface being for each scholar, at thirty-five centi- 
meters below the binocular line (and the other points of 
the surface, at a distance close to thirty-five centimeters), 
while permitting the forearm to be placed upon it without 
inclining the head or trunk or that the shoulder has to be 
raised. 

WorJiing manual. — The working manual designed to de- 
termine for each one the appropriate seat and desk will be 
quite simple. 

On the return of the classes, in a room of the building, 
are ranged on one side some stools of progressively increas- 
ing height and numbered from one to twenty, on the other 
side some desks whose inclination can be varied at will around 
a horizontal axis passing through the center of the desk 
top; the height of these tables is different and they are 
also numbered from one to twenty. These are the trial 
desks. 

The heights of the stools will succeed each other from 
five to five millimeters and will commence at thirty-two or 
thirty-three centimeters, in order to end at forty-two or 
forty-three centimeters if it is in a lycee, with some supple- 
mentary numbers above and below for the exceptional cases. 

It will be the same for the heights of the desks of this 
trial furniture which will be graduated from five to five 
millimeters between fifty-two and sixty-two, for example. 

In the aforesaid room, on the day of entrance of the 
classes^ the scholar presents himself with bare knees, dis- 



Individualization of School Furniture 159 

engaged above and below. He passes before the row of 
stools. The expert, supplied with a flat rale, halts the child 
as soon as the plane of a seat corresponds to the level of 
the prominence, the anterior tubercle of the tibia. This 
stool, which is found numbered six, let us say, is taken to 
a desk. The child seats himself at the successive desks 
until, his body remaining vertical, the T-square of thirty- 
five centimeters fills exactly the space between his eyes and 
the center of the desk top. The desk thus chosen is num- 
bered fourteen. Between the plane of the desk and that 
of the bench, the difference is large, it is a case of a long 
bust: we will assume that the inclination of the top should 
be 18°. 

These three numbers 6, 14, 18° are entered on the register 
opposite the name of the pupil X. The special assistant 
or workman will join a seat 6 with a desk 14 inclined to 18°. 

In the fitting out of the class room, this high desk will 
be placed toward the rear, the first rows being reserved 
for low desks, and the seat of pupil X will be located at a 
point on the classroom floor where a number or the name 
of the pupil will have been chalked. The procedure is the 
same for each scholar. 

At the first entrance in the classroom, the master having 
the register under his eye will have the greatest facility 
in assigning the places without disorder. All this is done 
very quickly, and assures really individual adaptation of 
desks, as I have been able to realize by numerous trials 
in schools. 

As to the degree of slope of the desk top, it suffices, 
empirically, to have the obliquity of the desk varied in the 
manner that the support of the forearm be secure and 
easy, the center of the desk top remaining invariably 35 
centimeters from the binocular plane. 



160 Growth During School Age 

The scholar is, in this way, in possession of a desk which 
corresponds truly to his proportions in the sitting position 
and is conceived in a fashion to follow the changes which 
growth will cause him to undergo. 

The child and the instruction are very greatly concerned 
in the putting into practice of this so simple process which 
is a guarantee for the freedom of bodily development as for 
freedom of mental activity. 



CHAPTER V 

CONTROL OF PHYSICAL EDUCATION BY THE AUXANALOGICAL 

METHOD 

Account to he taken of growth. — Checking of the effects of 
exercise with the fixed bar on the development of stat- 
ure, of the chest, of the pelvis, of the limhs. — Gymnasts 
and non-gymnasts. — Various causes of abstention. — 
Conclusions relative to the results of exercise aimed at 
and to the method of checking. 

ACCOUNT to be taken of growth. — ^We are in posses- 
sion of a precise method of determining the anatomical 
conditions presented by a child at a given moment of his 
growth. In effecting this determination, before applying 
to him a regime of physical education or a school regime, 
and in repeating this operation after several months or sev- 
eral semesters of use of this regime, the difference will ex- 
press clearly the gain realized. 

It will be necessary nevertheless to divide this gain be- 
tween two factors, the contribution of spontaneous growth 
having been ceaselessly added to the contribution due to the 
regime followed. 

It is at that point that the necessity of the previous study 
of growth clearly appears, as we have just done, by want 
of which we should be unable to appreciate better than our 
predecessors the results of any form whatever of physical 
education or of an unhealthy condition of development cre- 
ated for the child by the regime which he undergoes. 

161 



162 Growth During School Age 

Let us take for example an exercise for the present out 
of fashion, — exercise on the fixed bar. The fixed bar was 
scattered through all the play-grounds of the schools where 
I have observed, at the disposition of the pupils during 
recreation. The exercises to which it gave place were veri- 
table games, made methodical, however, by the periodical 
gymnastic lessons, and thus rendered useful without ceasing 
to be games. 

In the memoir entitled: "Du role de Panthropometrie en 
education physique" [The role of anthropometry in physical 
education], published in 1901, and which the "Academie de 
Medecine" crowned in 1912, I translated as well as possible 
the individual facts into curves. I shall give you only 
a concise interpretation of them, sufficient, however, to per- 
mit you to grasp thoroughly the course of an observation 
which arises from the experimentation on various sides, 
and which is shaped by the successive facts. It utilizes 
the guiding marks accepted in anthropometry and the con- 
tinuous comparison of children in experiment with an equal 
number of children for verification. 

I should be happy to have you find a guide for your 
educational or pedagogical evaluations in this practical ex- 
ample of the application of the auxanological method to a 
matter on which the educator is questioned every day. 

Checking of the effects of exercises with the fixed bar on 
the development of stature, of chest, of pelvis, of limbsf. 
Gymnasts and non-gymnasts. 

Stature. — The individual curves I, /, of Plate XII, repre- 
sent two adolescents who started at 143 cm. and reached 
finally 164 cm. The gymnast grows a trifle higher than the 
non-gymnast, and attains 1645 mm. 

The same fact strikes us when we glance at the follow- 
ing curve. The solid line is constantly as long, longer even 



n 



Physical Education and Auxanological Method 163 

than the broken line; the gymnast, of the same height, at 
fourteen and one-half years, as the non-gymnast, surpasses 
him at eighteen years. As long as the difference does not 
rise above one centimeter, one must, however, consider that 
there is equality, as M. Manouvrier teaches. This is what 
takes place for the curves of height I. 

The superiority becomes, on the contrary, absolute in 
groups V and VII, in favor of the gymnasts. Plate XII. 
The design of the two curves bearing the same number is 
not the same. The solid line approaches the straight line 
much nearer than the broken line does. 

The comparison of the portions of a solid-line curve with 
a corresponding broken-line curve gives place to some in- 
teresting remarks. From the point of departure, they pre- 
sent some differences of length which are pursued through- 
out the whole extent of the curve. The components of the 
solid line have very frequently some lengths almost equal 
between them ; those of the broken lines are of very unequal 
dimensions. 

Between two curves of gymnasts, starting from the same 
figure, there are often some striking resemblances, and some- 
times the figures are the same at corresponding stages. On 
the other hand, for the non-gymnasts, starting from a com- 
'mon height, no relations of this kind can be established at all. 

Leaving aside the details of the evolution and its rhythm, 
can we not already draw from the individual cases which 
we have just studied the following deduction? Of two adoles- 
cents of the same height at thirteen and one-half years, the 
one who will attain the greatest height is the gymnast. 

The individual cases analyzed are necessarily few, but the 
same phenomena are observed in almost all those which I 
possess. 

It is here, moreover, that the averages calculated on a 



164 Growth During ScJiool Age 

great number of particular curves come to furnish us some 
notions of such importance that they will suffice to weaken 
or ground the deduction which precedes. 

The averages recorded in A and B have been calculated 
on 100 individuals, 50 of whom applied themselves to gym- 
nastics, while the other 50 could be considered as non-gym- 
nasts. Plate XIV, A and B. 

The line A, height, starting like the line B from 142, at- 
tains 163, while the line B stops at 160. 

We can now, with great chances of certainty, formulate 
the following propositions : Gymnastics with apparatus does 
not hinder growth. It is even probable that the increase 
of height in gymnasts is more accentuated than in non-gym- 
nasts. This is for the adolescent at the period which ex- 
tends from fourteen and one-half to eighteen years. 

Chest girth. — After height, let us examine how chest girth 
behaves under the same circumstances. The chest circum- 
ferences are precisely those of the six subjects whose height 
we have just studied. Plate XII. 

At the first glance, one realizes that the chest girth of the 
non-gymnasts is totally differentiated from that of the gym- 
nasts. The latter rises regularly, the other irregularly. The 
latter crosses 15, 17, 20, 21 centimeters. The former in- 
creases 10 centimeters, and most often 8, 6 and even only 4 
centimeters in the same lapse of time. The development of 
the thoracic cage takes place in these two circumstancs in 
a wholly different fashion. 

In an analysis of the mode and rhythm of growth, we 
should note that the expansion of the thoracic cage, which 
is often figured by a number of centimeters greater than that 
of height, appears independent of the total elongation of the 
body. It affects a special rhythm which would be inter- 
esting to relate to that of the trunk. 



Physical Education and Aux analogical Method 165 

But that has only a secondary interest for us at the pres- 
ent time. What is important for us to know is the essen- 
tial characteristics which mark the difference between the 
thoracic cage of a gymnast and that of a non-gymnast from 
the point of view of augmention of girth. 

We noted first, as we have just said, the superiority of 
the total growth of the thorax of the gymnast over that 
of the non-gymnast. This superiority is much more ac- 
centuated than it is for height, and it is common to find a 
digression of 8 to 10 centimeters at eighteen years between 
two boys presenting an equal girth at fourteen and one- 
half years. One can investigate and understand this by ex- 
amining the perimetric curves with solid line and with broken 
line of group VII. 

The frequency oi plateaus is great in the course of the 
evolution of the thoracic cage; in the non-gymnasts, these 
plateaus, more numerous still, affect singularity by their ex- 
tent. It is not rare to observe the status quo during three, 
four, and even five semesters, as is seen in the broken-line 
curves of groups V and VII, in children who take no part 
in gymnastics. 

It is necessary to recognize that this is met with also 
in the gymnasts, but in general at the summit of the curve 
and not at its base. It is not at all before developing one's 
self that the stationary period is observed (see the solid-line 
curves V and VII) but only after having attained a certain 
fulness, and often the maximum development. 

The solid-line curves compared with each other have a 
sort of group resemblance; their general behavior is char- 
acterized by a rapid rising intersected by short arrests fol- 
lowed soon by new thrusts of ascension of great vigor. While 
the solid lines mount almost vertically, the broken-line curves 



166 Growth During School Age 

approach a horizontal plane; sometimes their upward tend- 
ency is almost zero, as in curve V. 

Aside from this form of ensemble, which is the expression 
of a great delay in the expansion of the osseous thorax, the 
curves of circumference of the non-gymnasts bear no com- 
paring at all between them, so great is the variability of 
their make-up, so great is their capriciousness. It is evi- 
dent, then, that the thorax of a gymnast grows more rap- 
idly and reaches a final expansion quite superior to that 
of a non-gymnast. 

The averages calculated on 100 particular cases (50 
gj^mnasts and 50 non-gymnasts) and taken back to one 
identical original girth, confirm what precedes and permit 
the formulation of a new proposition: gymnastics with ap- 
paratus procures for the thoracic cage greater amplitude 
than it will obtain spontaneously between fourteen and one- 
half and eighteen years. Plate XIV, A and B. 

Weight. — Let us now consider weight in the gymnasts 
and non-gymnasts, and see what happens while height in- 
creases and the body expands. We find an appreciable aug- 
mentation of weight on both sides. But, while in the non- 
gymnast this total augmentation oscillates around 14 kilos, 
it becomes SO, 25, 27, 29 kilos for the gymnasts. 

The form of the curve which expresses the progressive in- 
crease of weight holds in some fashion the middle place be- 
tween the height curve and the curve of chest girth. Plate 
XII. The greatest analogy is with this last. We find the 
same vigor of ascent as for height in the weight curve of the 
gymnast. For the non-gymnast the weight curve models 
itself in some fashion on the girth curve. 

In final analysis, the increase in weight of the gymnast 
is always superior to that of the non-gymnast. The solid 
line is constantly longer than the broken line. We are able 



Physical Education and Auxanological Method 167 

to formulate in accordance with the particular cases as in 
accordance with the averages our third proposition: gym- 
nastics with apparatus increases the density of the tissues^ 
the weight of the body of adolescents from fourteen and 
one-half to eighteen years. The gymnast almost always 
attains at eighteen years a weight superior to that of the 
non-gymnast. 

Thoracic organs. — Let us see now how anthropometry 
instructs us upon the modifications contributed by gym- 
nastics to certain partial dimensions of the body of the 
adolescent, and indicates to us within what limits the rela- 
tions which these dimensions have between them at the debut 
of the period of experimentation have varied. 

Pelvis and thorax. — Let us seek, for example, in what 
relation the pelvis is found over against the thorax; what 
are the relations of girth of the lower limbs with the upper 
limbs. Plate XIII. 

Without entering into a minute analysis of fact, we see 
on reading the curves of group B (average), that sponta- 
neously civilized life, in the college as in the family, favors 
the development of the pelvis and that of the lower limbs 
with greater activity than that of the thorax, of the breadth 
of the shoulders (bi-acromial) and of the upper limbs: the 
non-gymnasts present a growth of diameter of the pelvis 
much superior to that of the thoracic diameter as well as 
of tl:e bi-acromial diameter. In them, the girths of the 
thigh and calf have a development notably greater than the 
development of the girths of the arm and forearm. 

Averages and individual cases are unanimous and permit 
in consequence the following deduction: The lower limbs, at 
all times urged to action, grow more in volume than the 
upper limbs in individuals of fourteen and one-half to eight- 
een years, who apply themselves to the ordinary occupations 



168 Growth During School Age 

of urban life, of college without practicing gymnastics with 
apparatus; in them the diameter of the pelvis presents a 
total growth more considerable than that of the thoracic 
and shoulder (bi-acromial) diameter. This is what the ex- 
amination of the curves of group B demonstrates. 

If we pass from the non-gymnast to the gymnast, if we 
glance at the groups A (averages) the quasi-equahty of the 
curves strikes one at once by its very contrast with the in- 
equality of a moment ago. This length of the curves al- 
most equivalent explains the tendency of the thoracic girth 
and the upper limbs to take a development more consider- 
able under the influence of gymnastics. 

We see the circumference of the arm (taken at the level 
of the biceps) gain almost as many centimeters as the cir- 
cumference of the thigh. The forearm itself, in spite of ar- 
rests, benefits by an increase in volume (girth measured at 
its maximum) equal to that of the calf. 

A simple table will render more obvious the diff*erence of 
growth of the diameters and circumferences measured, ac- 
cording as one considers them in the gymnasts or in the 
non-gymnasts. 

Superiority in the growth of thoracic organs due to gymnastics. 
IN A PERIOD OF ABOUT FOUR YEARS 

Total average growth in 

centimeters 

f * . 

Lengths of diameter and girth. In non-gymnasts In gymnasts 

Diameters 

Shoulder (bi-acromial) 4 6 

Thoracic 3 5 

Pelvic 6 6 

Girths 

Arm 4 5 

Thigh 6 6 

Fore-arm 3 6 

Calf , 5 6 



Physical Education and Auxanological Method 169 

In this table are found the figures which are recorded on 
the curves of averages of groups A and B, which served to 
construct the table. At a glance one takes in the benefits 
due to gymnastics for every thoracic part of the body of 
the adolescent. The same diameters of the thoracic portion 
of the body are represented by some different figures ac- 
cording as they belong to the gymnast or to the non-gym- 
nast. This remark applies equally to the superior circum- 
ferences. Diameters and girths, on the contrary, remain 
identical or nearly so in the two groups when they concern 
the pelvic half of the body. 

It appears then that we are authorized from now on to 
lay down the following principle which is deduced from in- 
dividual facts as from averages. 

Equality in growth in volume of the four limhs as well 
as in simultaneous expansion (transverse diameters) of the 
thorax and pelvis, tends to he established under the influ- 
ence of gymnastics i/n adolescents from fourteen and one- 
half to eighteen years. 

General results. — Let us now turn back and examine in 
their ensemble the figures and the curves, in order to know 
if our four propositions express indeed everything which 
the facts represented in the graphs signify. It is not neces- 
sary to pursue the examination long in order to catch a 
general idea of the greatest importance which is bom at all 
points of the strict observation of facts. This is the regu- 
lative action on growth of gymnastics with apparatus. 

This exercise, it has been demonstrated to us,, does not 
prevent growing; it seems indeed to favor up to a certain 
point the growth of the body in length, the elevation of 
height, in other terms. We have also acquired the convic- 
tion that the thoracic cage takes under the influence of gym- 



170 Growth During School Age 

nasties with apparatus, greater amplitude than it would 
take spontaneously. 

We soon find a check on this amelioration in comparison 
with the enlargements of the pelvis. Spontaneously the pel- 
vis gains in amplitude more than the thorax in an equal 
time. When gymnastics intervene, the thorax is enlarged 
almost as much as the pelvis, which does not, however, di- 
minish its development in these circumstances. 

The same phenomenon is produced while accentuating it- 
self, when we compare girths of the thoracic members with 
those of corresponding parts of the pelvis, and the inequali- 
ties in progressive growth and in total augmentation between 
these two groups of organs is attenuated and even some- 
times disappears. Gymnastics with apparatus have contrib- 
uted to the reestablishing of equilibrium. 

This regulative action is explained, on all the curves ap- 
pended, by the simultaneousness in the increase, in height, in 
girth, and in weight, by the tendency to equalization of the 
partial developments of the two thoracic and pelvic halves, 
superior and inferior, of the body. 

This action is again manifested by the rarefaction of the 
times of arrest and the attenuation of the shocks which are 
produced in the course of the development of the body which 
assumes the proportions of a general regularity of rhythm 
of growth. 

So many facts are determined which, physiologically in- 
terpreted, lead to this conclusion : Gymnastics with appartus 
reduce none of the vital phenomena which are manifested 
hy the morphological growth of the organism. Nutritive 
work and its uniform distribution in the whole economy are 
energetically favored hy this process of physical education. 

So true is this that in matters of physical education "there 



Physical Education and Aux analogical Method 171 

are no bad means, there are only bad masters." ^ Here the 
habitual master has been nature and free imitation. I do 
not even mention the weekly lesson, whose value for the im- 
mense majority is known. Gymnastics have remained play. 

The same study is to be made for some other apparatus. 
But if the fixed bar gives such good results, what has one 
not a right to expect of apparatus less "congestive," ^ bet- 
ter understood, better adapted to man's aptitude and to his 
mode of struggle for existence? 

Do I need to call attention to the fact that none of the 
elements of classification which precede, could have been 
collected without anthropometry? The intervention of an- 
thropometry permits the substitution of precise and correct 
ideas on the effects of gymnastics for ideas too often false 
and always vague which have had currency to the present. 

Diverse causes of abstention. — "Would not children who 
do not take part in gymnastics be children constituted in 
a way relatively disadvantageous from some point of view, 
and would they not be incapable of attaining, even with 
the help of gymnastics, a skeletal and muscular development 
equal to that of children inclined to exercise themselves with 
a certain violence? Is there not a selection produced from 
the first attempts which would be encouraging for the vigor- 
ous ones "having the stuff" and discouraging on the con- 
trary for the feeble of constitution and of complexion?" 

Such is the objection which M. Manouvrier sought to offer 
me. I thank him for it. This question has in fact a great 
importance and, in attempting to answer it, I am going to 
fill up a lacuna of my memory. Yes, incontestably, there 
is a selection produced dating from the first trials. These 

^Ph. Tissie: "La fatigue," Paris, 1897. 

^Ph. Tissie: Art. "Gymnastique." — Larousse. 



172 Growth During School Age 

first trials are in fact encouraging for some, but they are 
not equally discouraging for all the others. Some of these 
latter derive benefit from that time on. A greater number 
leave the apparatus ; among these latter, there are some who 
will return of their own accord, there are some who will 
require that some circumstance or an order lead them back ; 
some others will remain refractory. 

In the ranks of the refractory are found some adolescents 
described as "weaklings." For these I have prescribed gym- 
nastics as a unique remedy. I can group together fourteen 
of them, seven of whom have followed my prescriptions while 
the seven others neglected to follow them. The fourteen 
were sickly in the same degree, of equally weak temperament 
(hyposthenic) and of very nearly like proportions, present- 
ing however some characteristics slightly different, so far 
as I was able to determine. Plates XIII and XIV. I have 
excluded the adolescents who had even slight deformities, 
scoliotic or others. 

These fourteen weaklings naturally were not included in 
making up the series of 100. The averages were established 
for each of these two groups under the same conditions as 
for the gymnasts and non-gymnasts previously studied. 

Let us examine now what observation brings to light on 
both sides of these two groups of averages presented as pre- 
viously under the form of curves. 

I. Group: Gymnasts. — Those rebuffed by the selection of 
the first lesson were able, although two years older, and of 
constitution as feeble as on their arrival at school, to take 
part in gymnastics, succeed in them, and, what is better, to 
benefit by them to the point of being fit for the voluntary 
military service at eighteen years. 

II. Group: Non-gymnasts. — These seven adolescents pre- 
sented some conditions much like those of the seven who had 



1 



Physical Education and Auxanological Method 173 

submitted themselves to the prescribed gymnastics. But, 
either by simply capricious stubbornness, or by conceit, or 
by indifference, or by desire of having himself dismissed 
from school, each one of these seven weaklings, who did not 
give in the different acts of their life any ^signs of laziness 
more pronounced than their gymnastic comrades, each one 
abstained absolutely from all gymnastics. In compelling 
them to play in all the recreations, to take part in all the 
walks and all the exercises in open air, to receive finally at 
the infirmary daily a dose of cod-liver oil, I had thought to 
make up for the gymnastic inaction. 

Now, none of these seven non-gymnasts has been able to 
enter service at eighteen years. All however had reached 
the regulation height, but presented at the time of enlist- 
ment an insufficient chest girth and too light a weight. 

I do not believe that the results would remain so absolute 
with more numerous series than this one. It seems to me 
nevertheless that these facts bring out with sufficient clear- 
ness some connected influences, the influence of gymnastics, 
and that there is reason to recognize that it exercises on all 
adolescents a really beneficial action however little assisted 
it be by bad natural disposition, as is met with, beyond 
doubt, in sickl}^ subjects. 

The selection which is produced dating from the first 
trials is confirmed by the very existence of this category of 
weaklings, by the adaptation of some and by the repulsion 
of others. The cause of this selection is certainly not single. 
The constitution appears, at first approach, to have a pre- 
ponderate influence. But a new factor soon appears which 
takes the lead, under certain circumstances, over the physi- 
cal constitution. I mean character. 

Do we not see, in fact, a certain number of those who had 
absented themselves from the apparatus at the moment of 



174 Growth During ScJwol Age 

their arrival at school, approach the apparatus later under 
the influence of an apparently insignificant incident, which 
acted as a determining cause only because it was of a nature 
to sound the key-note, the fundamental generator of the 
gamut of adolescent character? Their ardor lasts exactly 
as long as the determining cause lasts ; the initiative is ex- 
tinguished with the last vibrations of the key-note. It hap- 
pens that they may have had time to excel in the chosen 
exercise, although their medium or feeble constitution had 
appeared a priori a sufficient reason for their absention. 
Then, suddenly, they again become absentionists as before, 
while conserving the acquisition due to their temporary 
practice. 

Is it not also character which stamps the acts of that 
other adolescent? He is as little muscled at fifteen years as 
at fourteen; he is determined however to take gymnastics 
in his second year of school. Does he act from anxiety to 
assure his future physical fitness for the voluntary service? 
Does he not rather have for aim to learn to defend himself, 
wearied as he is of being victim? His aggressors are for 
the most part gymnasts, he had noticed, and he desires to 
become a gymnast to be able to cope with them. Running 
movements, movements called skilled ("de force") soon pos- 
sess no longer any secret for him. This weak fellow has 
succeeded in becoming a gymnast like the strong ones ; an 
imperfect gymnast he is, however, because the dangerous 
exercises constitute so many unsurijiountable obstacles. 
When he is summoned to execute one of them, he is invaded 
a by an uneasiness vague in its form but of a decisive power 
of inhibition. He recognizes himself capable of the effort 
which it demands, he feels the suppleness and the necessary 
skill; he could take up this movement quite like another; 
and yet he remains as if rooted to the spot. And he involun- 



Physical Education and Aux analogical Method 175 

tarily experiences the reproduction of this phenomenon in 
the presence of each of the exercises which require some 
hardiness. He has become a gymnast up to a certain point, 
but he is as incapable of defending himself as before. 

How could one in this case tax the constitution with the 
responsibility of the abstention of the first hour and not 
recognize the influence, on this manner of acting, of the 
character of the adolescent? This example shows again 
that the constitution is subject to giving way to a mastery 
which its feebleness did not permit of prediction. 

There is then, properly speaking, no normal constitution 
which cannot adapt itself to the exercises of gymnastics 
with apparatus. Certain constitutions are more advan- 
tageous than others, but none is disadvantageous in an 
absolute fashion. On the other hand, certain children find 
in their character the obstacle which the constitution has 
not opposed to them or the disposition which is their own, 
and disturbs the practice of a greater or lesser part of 
gymnastics. In the other exercises, in the games, this defect 
of character has some analogous consequences, capable of 
depriving the constitution of some of the best opportunities 
of fortifying itself. 

If there is no constitution refractory to gymnastics, does 
it follow that all the constitutions derive an equal benefit 
from their practice? The facts establish that the benefit is 
relative; in other words, some slender muscles will acquire 
the maximum development of which they are capable, the 
maximum force which agrees with their texture without 
changing this texture which will itself set an anatomical 
barrier to physiological progress. It is the same with the 
proportions of the skeleton, and it will be exceptional to see 
some systems with a delicate frame take on a bulky form 
under the sole influence of gymnastics. 



176 Growth During School Age 

The relative proportions have been notably improved on 
the contrary. The curves of weaklings (see p. 32) show us 
that in them, as well as in the precocious gymnasts, the 
development of the thoracic organs has taken an impetus, 
unknown up to then, dating from the moment when this 
special treatment was inaugurated. The thoracic organs 
of these weaklings have grown almost as much as the pelvic 
organs. The chest girth and weight have progressed in a 
fashion quite different and besides considerable in the sickly 
gymnasts from what they have done in the sickly non- 
gymnasts. 

In a word, if gymnastics have not been able to change the 
anatomical texture, if they have not been able, save excep- 
tionally, to make some large muscles out of slender ones, 
they have at least caused these muscles to acquire the great- 
est power of action which their texture admits of. As to 
their very indirect influence on the skeleton, it is more easily 
appreciable at sight in the weak than in the strong, be- 
cause the muscles of the former cover the bones with a 
thinner veil, but it is not more marked in the one than in 
the other. 

The effects of exercise on the skeleton merit withal a 
particular study which will come in its time. While wait- 
ing, to rely only on the relative progress of weight, one can 
note that gymnastics enlarge the skeleton of the strong 
like the skeleton of the weak in a certain measure. 

Perhaps, in the present discussion, one could place him- 
self at another point of view and consider directly the groups 
formed by the selection which is produced from the time of 
the first efforts, as M. Manouvrier had forecast. 

Let us first cast a glance on the figures entered at the 
origin of the average curves of the non-gymnasts, and relate 
them to the same figures of average curves of gymnasts. 



\ 



Physical Education and Auxanological Method 177 

These numbers express the averages of measurements 
taken at the very time when the selection which interests us 
was effected. Now these numbers are almost equal, which 
fact indicates already that vigor is not the natural adjunct 
of one only of the two fields, if one admits at all that the 
measurements taken be capable of instructing on the vigor 
of the adolescents observed. 

If one proceed by constructing a series of the figures fur- 
nished by the individual measurements, and if one take care 
to repeat this operation for each one of the two groups, it is 
perceived that none of the two fields offers the homogeneity 
upon which one would have believed to be able to count, and 
that, quite the contrary, both present some strong and some 
weak. Comparison between them of the elements of this 
double seriation demonstrates clearly that the proportion 
of the strong and the weak is quite equal on both sides, as 
well, naturally, as the proportion of the average constitu- 
tions. 

This direct examination of groups, resulting from selec- 
tion, which follows the first trials, leads us then to consider 
as secondary the role of the constitution in this selection, 
which is produced under the multiple influences of which 
some of the principles have been studied above. 

From another aspect, also, this initial distribution pro- 
voked by gymnastics is interesting. It furnishes a valuable 
indication for medical or moral intervention and sometimes 
for both simultaneously. It is in certain cases a useful aux- 
iliary in the determination of temperaments. 

If then gymnastics, — and the few preceding pages seem 
capable of being summed up thus, — if open air and free gym- 
nastics are no more able to make up the defects of character 
than to fill up the lacunae of constitutions, they represent 
at least an exercise within the reach of every individual, a 



178 Growth During School Age 

merit which not all the agents of physical education possess. 
One must besides recognize in it an energetic and recom- 
mendable action on the general and local development of the 
organism and regard as applicable to all normal adolescents, 
without distinction of strength or weakness, the four prop- 
ositions which I have attempted to establish in the first part 
of this memoir. 

Conclusions relative to the results of exercise aimed at and 
of the method of checking. 

In adolescents from fourteen and one-half to eighteen 
years, gymnastics with apparatus: 

1. Does not injure growth in height. 

2. Procures for the thoracic cage more amplitude than it 
would take spontaneously. 

3. Increases the density of the tissues, the weight of the 
body. 

4. Favors actively equality in the increase in volume of 
the four limbs, in the simultaneous expansion of the chest 
and pelvis, and in a general manner regulates the vital phe- 
nomena which are manifested by the morphological aug- 
mentation of the organism. 

Let us state also, in formulating it, the method which .has 
been followed for the first time in researches of this kind, 
and which appears to me of a nature to cause physical edu- 
cation to progress scientifically as a science of improving 
of the organism applied to the child and to the adolescent : 

(a) It is necessary that the study of growth precede that 
of the modifier, the agent of physical education. 

(b) To know the lasting, definite changes due to an exer- 
cise, it is necessary to make the researches bear on what is 
the most susceptible of becoming definitive, namely, its re- 
mote effects, its results at a distance. 



Physical Education and Auxanological Method 179 

I am convinced that the new French conception of gym- 
nastics, daughter of Richepin's thought 'and of Greek tradi- 
tion, the energetic initiative of the naval lieutenant Hebert, 
will benefit largely from this same auxanological method of 
control which will put in relief, for each of the pupils of the 
navy, the vigor developed to the highest degree in respect, 
throughout the period of growth, of the harmonious lines of 
human proportions. 



CHAPTER VI 

ASYMMETRY AND EDUCATION 

Half of the body. — Variation of the length of the sternum 
and rickets. — The shoulders of the child. — Asymmetry 
of the human body; those things which it is necessary to 
know by reason of their educative interest. — Probable 
part taken by the brain in functional asymmetries. — 
Bimanual education (ambidexterity), 

HALF of the body. — If the instrument has measured the 
total height of the body, divide this height by two and 
you can have a horizontal plane passed at the height at which 
the point corresponding to the figure obtained will be found, 
certain that you are cutting the body into two sections of 
equal length. This brief operation causes to stand out the 
difference of the constitution of these two halves and re- 
minds you of what we said of the complexity of the stature. 
If you repeat the operation on several persons, you are 
struck by the different organs in each which the imaginary 
horizontal median cuts. And if you repeat it on the same 
child every six months, you will be interested by the displace- 
ment of the organs relative to the horizontal median plane, 
you will be interested to the point that you will pursue the 
investigation by the measures and multiple notations which 
you hesitated somewhat to undertake ; you will want to know 
how and why these organs are displaced in the child in travail 
of growth ; you v/ill want to see him grow and understand 
how he grows, having a misgiving about the influence which 

180 



Asymmetry and Education 181 

these notions cannot help having on your educative direction. 

Variations of the length of the sternum and rickets. — 
Forthwith this investigation will reserve for you some sur- 
prises and will permit you to calm the parents who are tor- 
mented by the incurvation of the sternum, which they have 
ascertained in their child. 

Isolated, this concave or convex incurvation is not at all 
a sign of rickets, but an effect of the irregular parapuberal 
growth. 

Periodical examination of the same child will cause you to 
witness the resumption of the actual elongation of the ster- 
num which had appeared to be arrested a longer or shorter 
time. In reality, the great thoracic cartilage had not ceased 
to grow in length, but the irregular growth having too often 
in the civilized child, in the city child, in the scholar, broken 
the parallelism between the spurt of costal elongation and 
that of the ligaments which fasten the sternum at the two 
extremities, there has followed an incurvation of the sternum 
which contrived to mask its real elongation. 

From now on, as a result of an opposite evolution, arrest 
or reduction of the rate of lengthening of the ribs and the 
conjunctive puberal spurt of growth, the sternum is going 
to find itself partially liberated, and the observer witnesses 
from this moment, the straightening of the sternum. He is 
a witness of this contradictory phenomenon of a cartilage 
which appears to recover its activity of growth at the very 
moment when the cartilaginous tissue of the body is struck 
by arrest or by reduction in its growth. We know that only 
the effect of straightening is there. 

This change in the anatomical disposition of the sternum 
is correlative of the change of direction of the major aug- 
mentation of the lungs, which passes, at the same time 
(puberty) from horizontal to the vertical plane. 



182 Growth During School Age 

The shoulders. — The disposition shown by the shoulders 
has a great influence upon the aspect of the silhouette. One 
notes : high shoulders, low or drooping, average or ordinary, 
that is, deviating more or less from the horizontal plane and 
presenting from top to bottom a certain obliquity from the 
neck to the acromion. The high shoulders themselves only 
rarely attain a horizontal position. You will consequently 
note various functional correlations of each of these con- 
formations and I urge you to note them. 

Theoretically, the shoulders must be symmetrical. In 
reality, one of the shoulders is lower than the other; it is 
the right which habitually occupies the lower plane. 

It is understood that you record simply an inequality 
which your practiced eye causes you to perceive, but I do 
not ask you to measure it. It would be necessary for that 
purpose to take the measurements bilaterally as I have done 
in the course of my researches on growth, and that would go 
beyond the field to which your complex role obliges you to 
limit yourself. 

The inequality of height of the two shoulders is an asym- 
metry which has been attributed to fencing (Lagrange) and 
by other authors to a defect of conformation. I have been 
able to establish that it was a normal asymmetry, and to 
class it under the head of the functional asymmetries. It 
results from the activity of the upper right limb, infinitely 
more intense than that of the upper left. 

Asymmetries; their educative interest. — And besides, al- 
though the investigation which I urge the educator to make 
does not bring on a contest with these shades of morphology, 
I believe I ought to instruct you briefly on the principal 
asymmetries and their causes. They constitute, in fact, 
some particulars which are in the medical line, especially, 
but do not fail to off'er for you, educators, a lively interest. 



Asymmelry and Education 183 

Distribution of asymmetries ^- — It is sometimes spoken of 
the asymmetries which the equal organs can present in the 
normally shaped man ; a rigorous method has never, so far 
as I know, been applied to their determination. I have had 
recourse to what had been taught me in 1893-1894 by Pro- 
fessor Manouvrier; I have extended it to the two sides of 
the body on 200 young men; the following are the differ- 
ences which I was enabled by it to establish between the 
right and left side. 

"1. The upper right limb is larger than the left by a half 
centimeter. 

"2. For the pelvic members, it is, on the contrary, the 
left which exceeds the right; the difference is a, half centi- 
meter, and it is maintained to the level of the calf. 

"3. Functional superactivity is then crossed. The more 
active nutrition which it carries with it must have so much 
influence on the elongation of the members which are the 
seat of it as on their augmentation of volume. This is, in 
fact, what takes place. 

"The upper right limb minus the hand (humerus and 
radius) is longer than the left by one centimeter. 

"The lower left limb minus the height of the foot (femur 
and tibia ) is longer than the right by one centimeter. These 
differences of length hold a proportional part in the seg- 
ments of the limbs. 

"4. Left-handed persons observed constitute a valuable 
check; in a great number the superiority of volume and of 
length remains crossed, but in the reverse direction. 

"5. The greatest length of the lower left limb in right- 
handed persons raises the whole corresponding side of the 

* According to my two notes to I'Academie des Sciences, the first read 
by Marey in 1900, the second, continuation of the first, read by Professor 
Laveran ten years later, in 1910. 



184 Growth During School Age 

trunk; the left iliac spine higher by one centimeter reveals 
the inclination of the pelvis. It is the same with chest girth, 
of which the left extremity of the scapula exceeds the right 
by one centimeter on an average. 

"6. The left calf, which is the more voluminous, is also 
lower than the right by nearly one centimeter. 

"7. The ears show equally a notable and almost constant 
asymmetry; on measuring their grand vertical axis, an ex- 
cess of 5 millimeters in favor of the left ear is found." 

The asymmetry of the ears is modified with age in the 
course of growth; it has a tendency to attenuate itself espe- 
cially when it was very marked in the little child, or even in 
the boy or girl before puberty. So a child of thirteen years, 
whose left ear, for example, is longer than the right, by 
more than a half centimeter, will see at a given moment, in 
the neighborhood of the dawn of puberty, its right ear alone 
grow, the smaller one, which seems to hasten to join the 
other, which moreover awaits it and does not grow any more. 
The difference between the two cannot be more than two 
millimeters at eighteen years. The fact of this unilateral 
growth is quite individual ; I am emphasizing this point to 
you. 

It is a thing to be noted, while taking care not to draw 
general conclusions from it too quickly, that the twenty- 
three subjects of thirteen and one-half years, bearers of 
strong auricular asymmetries were for the most part some 
"minus habens." Excepting the two who have made their 
way in life, and two others who have lived "like everybody," 
there are ten young men endowed with mediocre talent, ^ix 
lacking talent and three incapablcs, not only from the pojnt 
of view of school but also from the point of view of trade 
If these last nine are classed in the category of abnormals, 
in this case, a strong asymmetry of the ears would be met 



I 



Asymmetry and Education 185 

with in 40 per cent of abnormals. The fact is to be checked 
up, but it demands the greatest reserve in its interpretation, 
like all the morphological manifestations of psychical states, 
moreover. 

In my second note to I'Academie des Sciences, I insisted 
on the variations of asymmetry in the course of growth and 
its causes. At thirteen years, the right side is superior to 
the left : in length and in thickness, in the arm and the fore- 
arm; in height, at the neck and at the abdomen inferior. 
Nevertheless the left side prevails over the right side; in 
length and in thickness, at the thigh and at the leg; in 
height, at the thorax. 

Variations in the course of growth. — Between thirteen and 
eighteen years, especially, each pair of members, each pair 
of corresponding segments, either are differentiated more, 
or conserve almost the same asymmetry: the asymmetries of 
length of the two forearms, of the two thighs and the asym- 
metry of the thickness of the two arms are accentuated with 
age, and realize abruptly an important augmentation at the 
moment of the appearance of puberty about the age of 
fifteen and one-half years. 

Some semestrial variations characterize on the contrary 
the inequalities which hold between the length of the right 
arm (humerus) and that of the left arm, between the thick- 
ness of the right forearm and that of the left forearm. In 
spite of these oscillations, which are in relation with the 
"alternations of growth" as they spring from my researches, 
these latter asymmetries are almost at eighteen years what 
they were at thirteen years. 

A comparable stability is met in the neck in the difference 
of height, to the advantage of the right, of its two lateral 
halves ; the superiority of height of the left hemithorax is 
in the same case. 



186 Growth During ScJiool Age 

The abdomen behaves very differently according as one 
regards its superior portion, the superiliac or its inferior 
portion, the interiliac. This latter maintains, in the course 
of growth, the superiority of its right half ; however, for the 
superiliac portion, the superiority from one semester to 
another passes from left to right and vice versa. 

Causes of asymmetry. — The asymmetries of the thoracic 
members exist in the new-born. They are measurable. The 
other asymmetries are not. I mean those of the neck, of the 
trunk, and of the pelvic members. 

The first proceed then from the ontogenetic embryo-foetal 
elaboration determined, I think, by heredity. The various 
factors other than heredity do not resist analysis. More- 
over, hereditary left-handedness and hereditary ambidex- 
terity are not contested. Why should it be otherwise with 
hereditary right-handedness } 

We are quite certainly in the presence of heredity of a 
character acquired by the effect of the functional conditions 
of daily life. A particular circumstance of its evolution 
seems favorable to this manner of looking at it, — it is its 
progress throughout age, in an inverse direction from that 
of growth, but in the very direction of the function. And, 
besides, do we not see the "consecutive" asymmetries, those 
of the abdominal members, of the trunk, of the neck, at the 
genesis of which we were present, proceed although indirectly 
from the function? to derive from the unilateral localization 
of manual superactivity.?^ 

In effect, it is to be dated from the time when the child 
stands up and commences to act in a continuous fashion, 
during waking hours, that the "consecutive" asymmetries 
appear little by little: those of the lower limbs which sub- 
side under the surcharge of the corresponding side, right in 
the right-handed, left in the left-handed, leave the role the 



Asymmetry and Education 187 

more active^ the superiority of the length of bone and muscu- 
lar hyperplasia, which creates the crossed asymmetry men- 
tioned in my note of 1900. There come again, under the 
action of this surcharge of the superior right limb, the lower- 
ing of the right shoulder, in the right-handed, the sinking 
of the summit of the right hemithorax, the following up of 
the first dorsal vertebrae of this same side, with production 
of an inflexion of the dorsal spine to a left convexity, that 
is, in an inverse direction to the most habitual pathological 
incurvation and even to the physiological depression due to 
the aorta. By compensation, the cervical column becomes 
convex to the right, and the head remains lightly inclined to 
the left. Below, the inclination to the right of the pelvis 
corrects the compensating tendencies of the sub-thoracic 
segment of the vertebral column.: 

In the left-handed, these phenomena are reversed. The 
ambidextrous person does not show them if his bimanual 
activity is, not special, but general. 

Is one not authorized to admit that there have likewise 
been some asymmetries which it is necessary for us now to 
consider as primitive, and that they are also born of func- 
tion? I am forced to this conclusion so much the more 
because I have seen the different asymmetries more or less 
completely effaced, without excepting from it those of the 
superior members, in the adolescents, in whom, aided by some 
informed educators, I have succeeded in having the habit of 
bimanual dexterity (ambidexterity) acquired. 

Probable part taken by the brain in the functional asym- 
metries, — Quite recently, a distinguished physician of Cette, 
Dr. Herber, has proposed as cause of localization at the 
right of manual superactivity, the place of the heart at the 
left and the natural tendency to avoid or at least to dimin- 
ish the injuries which the work of the left arm might cause it. 



188 Growth During School Age 

This seems logical. Clinically, the author establishes some 
close correlations between the functioning of the heart and 
the functioning of the superior left limb ; the numerous left- 
handed persons whom one meets do not, however, argue in 
this direction. The functional activity of the superior left 
limb which a bimanual education commenced early obtains 
easily in the right-handed, which I myself have obtained, has 
not furnished me any occasion to verify any repercussion 
on the heart. 

If the heart were by the place which it occupies at the 
left, the cause of the above-mentioned localization, left- 
handedness would have to be the exclusive appanage of those 
whose heart occupies the right side of the thorax. Now, 
out of 100 left-handed persons, I have not found a single 
case of visceral (splanchnic) inversion, of transposition of 
the heart to the right. I have seen of them only the invet- 
erate left-handed, adults showing no sign at all of degen- 
eracy such as one encounters in great number. 

It is advisable nevertheless not to decide against this 
manner of looking at the question before having observed 
much. So much the more as this functional correlation 
between the superior limbs and the heart would perhaps be 
susceptible of enlightening the question of the part taken by 
the brain in the functional asymmetries. 

A functional localization can possibly imply a cerebral 
participation. That is doubted by no one. The question is 
to know if it is a matter of an anatomical modification at 
the level of the center called to preside over the superactive 
unilateral function, or indeed if there is on the cerebral side 
only a state of physiological repose, an educative insuffi- 
ciency, bearing no injury at all to the cellular condition, 
and consequently susceptible of being modified by an appro- 
priate education. 



Asymmetry and Education 189 

In 1883, — Bardeleben had not yet, as much as I know, 
touched this subject, — I had the occasion to examine two 
brains of left-handed Arabs, a young man and an old one. 
A profound study of these two brains showed no trace in 
them at all of macroscopic anatomical modifications corre- 
sponding to the function of the superior limbs. 

On the other hand, my different statistics of left-handed 
persons among the Arabs and the Kabyles, in soldiers of 
various regions of France, in scholars, of whom I have com- 
pared metrically the two hands and the two feet, have never 
revealed to me a particular state of the less active member 
susceptible of hindering it at a given moment, from doing 
as the other member. 

Bimanual education (ambidexterity ) . — In a great num- 
ber of young people, several days of exercise sufficed to ren- 
der the left hand qualified to execute the greater part of the 
useful movements which the right hand alone executed before. 
At this very time, I have just obtained with a month of 
exercise in a little left-handed girl of eleven years who is 
two years from her puberty (see Chapter X), the indiffer- 
ent use of both hands. It was a matter of a lateral curva- 
ture of the spine (scoliosis) by functional asymmetry; the 
curvature has yielded in four months. 

The effect of bimanual education is an excellent argu- 
ment in favor of the purely physiological participation of 
the brain in the primordial functional asymmetry of the 
superior limbs ; it tends to demonstrate that left-handed- 
ness is not at all a steady sign of degeneration; it is at the 
same time a valuable pedagogical indication. 

In a child in whom the asymmetry of the shoulders ap- 
pears to accentuate itself with exaggeration, hasten to have 
the "lazy hand" exercised systematically. If the child is 
still two years from his puberty, the education will be com- 



190 Growth During School Age 

pleted quickly enough. It would have been still more rapid 
if the parents had dreamed of habituating their child from 
the c/adle up to serve himself with both hands. You witness 
the return of a symmetry more or less perfect, in the shoul- 
ders, in the upper limbs, in the lower limbs, in the trunk. 

This education is quite amenable to the educator. It has 
nothing special about it, and it endows the child with appre- 
ciable resources. According to the results which you Avill 
obtain, the physician will make to a certainty the differen- 
tial diagnosis and will reject all thought of rickets if the 
symmetries are restored. 

You judge by this example of the measure in which you 
can aid the action of the physician by the processes them- 
selves which give to your educative direction its greatest 
fulness and its most fruitful influence. 

Dr. Livi admits,^ as cause of the predominance of right- 
handedness, the first position known by the foetus in the 
uterus, which results from the place occupied by the intes- 
tines of the mother. The superior right limb, finding itself 
directed toward the abdominal wall of the mother, is free ; 
it has greater ease for exercising itself, and it is the right 
hand which will act after birth. 

I adhere entirely to this physiological conception which 
leaves to function its predominant role and does not elim- 
inate the influence of heredity. 

^ Dr. R. Livi, — "Sulla causa del clestrismo e del mancinismo" (Atti. soc. 
roni. adtropol. 1908, vol. 14, pp. 91-94). 



CHAPTER VII 

AUXANOLOGICAL, INVESTIGATION OF THE SCHOLAR 

Anatomical conditions of function. — Form and skeleton. — 
Their modification hy growth. — Anthropometric guid- 
ing-marks. 

EACH of the educative applications considered in the 
preceding chapters of this second part have shown that 
the educator was not free to make simultaneously to several 
children the application of an educative and pedagogical 
process, and the absolute necessity for him to individualize 
the process whatever it be in the physical order as in the 
intellectual. Nothing then is more natural and besides more 
logical than now to enter upon the chief object of the educa- 
tional aims by the analytical study of the development of 
the child, that is, the determination of his somatic individ- 
uality. 

The individual formula, to which my researches have led 
me, synthesise sufficiently the somatic individuality at each 
instant of growth, and that part of the cerebral individuality 
which is responsible for it. 

The gathering up of the elements necessary to the making 
up of the individual formula is made by means of the proc- 
esses of observation of the child which we have called "aux- 
anological method," to state in a word that it is periodical, 
that it follows the same child from semester to semester, 
that it is anthropometric, not by one, two, or three measure- 
ments, but by many, that is, finally physiological and clinical. 

191 



192 Growth During School Age 

Let us study first this process of investigation of the child, 
after which we shall see how the indications collected must 
be treated in order to end in making up the "individual 
formula." 

• • <c • *. • • 

From each of the general notions, anatomy, physiology, 
clinic, etc., we shall retain here only the notions indispensa- 
ble to the knowledge which we propose to acquire. Thus it 
is that the "form" will be considered solely in function of 
growth. The analysis of the form of the skeleton is to be 
studied with special attention, because it is the surest guide 
for the observer throughout the maze of organs. 

Anatomical conditions of function. — With my eminent 
teacher, Professor L. Manouvrier, I am seeking to grasp 
function, to know its degree of activity and of perfection 
throughout the anatomical conditions by relying on the 
anthropometric relations and the correlations. The varia- 
tions of form as they are shown in the course of growth, aid 
singularly in interpreting the relations of the surface with 
depth. 

Still, it is necessary that the dimensions of the body be 
well determined, that its proportions have been exactly cal- 
culated, if one desires to search into and understand the 
modifications which growth carries along with it. That 
necessitates some fixed guiding-marks which the skeleton will 
furnish, which is the ensemble of the various pieces support- 
ing the organs, gives them their attachment, constitutes for 
them a box, a cage or a sheath, procuring for them protec- 
tion and functional aid. 

Also our duty as educator is to have a very clear-cut idea 
of the skeleton, to know so exactly those of its prominences 
chosen as guiding-marks that the finger will find them in- 
stantly. 



i 



Auxanological Investigation and the Scholar 193 

Form and skeleton. — Plate XV. It is indispensable that 
we draw mentally the skeleton through the contours of the 
teguments of the subject whom we are observing, and that 
we be in no wise embarrassed to reconstruct it, if instead of 
an adult, we have to examine a child of whom the parts of 
the skeleton are among each other in a very different rela- 
tion from what they are in the adult or even in a child of 
another age. 

With this relation changes the silhouette by reason of the 
leading influence of the frame on the forms. One is conscious 
of the modifications undergone by the silhouette with the 
successive ages of the period of growth, one is conscious of 
these modifications throughout the digressions of the form, 
but it is difficult by a simple examination to specify the 
nature of the modifications. 

The only means for us to get a correct idea of it is to 
utilize the guiding-marks and the measure by the estimate 
of distances, then to compare between them the relations to 
which the dimensions noted give place. 

The osseous frame determines the skeletons of the human 
silhouette ; it limits also the cavities occupied by the internal 
organs, by the viscera, so that it is truly the bond of union 
between the organs of the surface and the interior organs. 
The skeleton is the support of the locomotive apparatus, 
which is attached to it and regulates its own dimensions by 
those of the skeleton. For these various reasons the skele- 
ton will remain the point of support of our observations 
throughout the successive ages until the end of the period 
of growth. 

The 193 bones of which the skeleton is composed when it 
is complete and not provided with supernumerary bones, 
interest us only in so far as they are grouped in organs. 

There are thus two cavities and four limbs formed which 



194? Growth During School Age 

we must well understand anatomically in order that the inter- 
pretation of their physiological correlations may be easy 
and certain. The cavities are bounded by bones of flattened 
form while the limbs are represented by long bones. 

In the vertebral column, as at the level of the extremeties, 
where the hand and the foot are attached to the limbs, one 
meets a third sort of bone, the short bones. Their role is in 
some respect that of the balls in the wheel-work of certain 
machines, they multiply the articular surfaces and render 
more varied, more supple and stronger the play of the hand 
like that of the foot. The vertebral column also utilizes the 
short bones, although in a slightly different way; but it is 
however from the multiplicity of articulations that it derives 
the marvelous variety of its movements and force. 

The articulation permits the bones to assume with regard 
to each other positions favorable to the movements to be 
accomplished. They furnish some guiding-marks, some 
stopping-points for our eye and our finger. 

Finally, the greater part of the bones present some 
apophyses, that is, some prominences, some tuberosities, 
some kinds of excrescences designed to give attachment to 
some ligaments and some muscles. 

Some of these prominences are excellent guiding-marks for 
us, the best which could be for the reconstruction of the 
skeleton and the evaluation of its dimensions. 

The two grand cavities are that of the trunk and that of 
the cranium. 

The ribs and the pelvis, joined by the vertebral column, 
form together a vast reservoir where numerous organs are 
located. Everyone knows their names. It is their functional 
role which is of importance to us. Now, in their ensemble, 
they constitute what we can call the "transformer-distribu- 
tor" of nutrition. 



J\ 



AuxaTwlogical Investigation and the Scholar 195 

The digestive apparatus transforms what comes to it from 
the outside into assimilable substance, which the lymph and 
the blood next distribute to the tissues whose nutrition they 
thus assure. 

The trunk is then a power generating furnace. The neck 
is the communication between the trunk and the cranium ; 
it is through it that the distribution of nutrition passes up 
from below and the distribution of nervous force belonging 
to the brain centers passes down from above. The trunk 
and the brain fill the role of "accumulator-dispenser" of 
energy. 

Above the neck, above that cervical portion of the ver- 
tebral column of which one easily sees the isolation from the 
rest of the skeleton, and supported by it, rises the other 
cavity, the cranial case. 

The whole encephalon is inclosed in it. Below the cere- 
brum are found, with the cerebellum, the successive convolu- 
tions continued downward by way of the spinal cord which 
descends in the channel of the vertebral column. 

It is the cerebrum which occupies the highest part as well 
as the greatest, and it is the variations of its volume which 
decide the dimensions of the reservoir which constitutes the 
cranium. 

It is then understood that, when we measure the cranium, 
we do not measure the brain, but that we evaluate the ca- 
pacity of a cavity whose dimensions are proportional to 
that of the brain itself; we have in a way, on the volume of 
the brain, some information such that we can formulate 
from the latter an evaluation sufficiently close. 

From this shaft of the spinal axis which extends from 
the hip-bones, the point of support in a sitting posture, to 
the top of tlie cranium, and which is designated under the 
name of bust, are detached four branches at different levels, 



196 Growth During School Age 

but which arje all located on the trunk, on the thoracic- 
pelvic cylinder. 

The four limbs offer habitually a twofold symmetry com- 
parable to that which is found in the trunk to the right and 
the left of the median line, of the axis of the body, of the 
spinal column. 

The limbs are of interest to the educator by reason of 
their relative length, that is by reason of the proportion 
which holds between their length and the power of the central 
vital organs. They interest us again by reason of the re- 
sources of which they dispose for action. These resources 
are manifested by the relative thickness of the bones and of 
the muscles of a like segment, of the forearm, for example 
(the segment of the upper limb included between the elbow 
and the hand). 

Anthropometrical guiding-marks. — Let us suppose now 
that we wish to reconstruct this reservoir, to evaluate the 
relations which these various parts affect between them; it 
will from now on be with the meter and no longer with the 
eyes, and no longer by means of an approximate mental 
representation that we shall have "to see" the skeleton. 
Plates XV and XVI. 

Let us not forget that it is on the living body that we 
must find it ; it is through the flesh covered with its tegu- 
ments that we must reconstruct it. Also we shall never 
have the guiding-marks fixed too accurately, and we shall 
never be too well acquainted with their disclosures on the 
living body. 

The anthropometric guiding-marks are the following: 

The top, the culminating point of the head or vertex. 

The point of the prominence which guards the entrance 
to the auditory canal or point of the antitragus. 



Auxanological Investigation cmd the Scholar 197 

The sternal furculum or fork, or the superior edge of 
the sternum. 

The pubis, superior surface of the median part of the 
anterior bone of the pelvis. 

The grand trochanter, the superior edge of the promi- 
nence which forms the upper extremity of the femur. 

The acromion, the outer end of the process of the scapula 
which forms an arch over the head of the humerus. 

The medius, the lower extremity of the middle finger of 
the hand. 

The guiding-marks which precede are used to determine 
heights above the ground. 

The measure of diameters requires two guiding-marks sit- 
uated in the same horizontal or vertical plane, except for 
the antero-posterior diameter of the cranium, where one 
takes the center of the forehead approximately (at the 
metopic point) and the point the farthest removed from the 
occipital convexity. The other guiding-marks of diameters 
of the cranium are : the most widely separated parietal con- 
vexities for the maximum transverse diameter, then, for 
vertical diameter, the distance from the vertex to the anti- 
tragus. 

The thorax offers, as level for diameter, the sterno- 
xiphoidian space, the top of the sternum, and it is at this 
level that the corresponding prominence is sought in the 
vertebral column. 

It is at the level also of the articulation of the xiphoid 
appendix with the sternum that the space between the lateral 
convex surfaces of the ribs is determined. 

The girths are taken at the level of the maximum thick- 
ness, the greatest thickness corresponding to the swell or 
belly of the muscles, and at the level of the minimum thick- 



198 Growth During School Age 

ness, the smallest thickness of the segment. The minimum 
thickness answers to the thickness of the bones. These two 
circumferences are taken on the forearm, according to our 
individual record card. 

The chest girths are taken at two heights. The one passes 
immediately under the armpits, the other at the level of the 
articulation of the posterior segment of the sternum (xiphis- 
ternum). The form of a truncated cone and the various re- 
liefs of the trunk render these circumferences difficult to take 
with exactness and almost impossible in the feminine sex. 

There are only few advantages in replacing them by the 
chest diameters. 

The extremities, the foot and the hand are well marked 
by a sketch of their contour. But it is necessary to know 
how to recognize the head or the anterior extremity of the 
first and fifth metatarsus, and likewise, in the hand, the 
second and fifth metacarpus, because the distance which 
separates them represents the diameter of each of these 
organs. The extremity from the styloid process of the 
radius to the wrist, quite easy to recognize, marks the termi- 
nation of the forearm and the beginning of the hand. The 
tangential transversal line to the extremity of the finger or 
of the longest toe marks the end of these two organs. This 
last is sometimes the great toe, sometimes the second. 



CHAPTER VIII 



MEASUREMENT OF THE SCHOLAR IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE 
"individual RECORD OF GROWTh" ^ 



The observation room. — The anthropometric instruments. — 
Care in checking one*s self. — Working manual. — 
Heights, diameters, circumferences, contours, weight. 

OBSERVATION ROOM.— Yon will realize the indispen- 
sable conditions of scientific observation in not fearing 
to study carefully each of the details susceptible of con- 
tributing to your good preparation. 

In a room rather small, easy to heat, have a very smooth 
artificial platform or floor on which the child's feet will not 
strike any splinters ; a platform which assures an even hori- 
zontal plane for the soles of the subject's feet and for the 
lower end of the measuring instrument. If this floor is made 
a part of the instrument as in the auxanometer, it is un- 
necessary to have a special one constructed; this is clear 
gain and is convenient. The measures of height once taken, 
the platform of the auxanometer disappears with the instru- 
ment and does not encumber the floor of the room. 

The subject under observation is placed on this platform 
facing the window. The observer turns his back to the light 
and sees the child whom he is examining in full light. The 
secretary, seated facing the light, has before him a table 

^Dr. Paul Godin, La Formule individuelle de croissance. Paris, A. 
Maloine, edit., 1913, et a I'lnstitut — J. J. Rousseau. Mensurations pages 
2, 3, 5, 6. Notations pages 1, 3, 4, 6, 7, 9, 10, 11, et 12. 

199 



200 Growth During School Age 

whose one end is a half meter from the platform of the 
instrument, within reach so he can take up from it at need 
various instruments: the measuring tape, the pen, the cali- 
per, the small metal gauge or the large wooden gauge. 

Anthropometric instruments. — The instrument standing 
alone (it forms a stationary part of the platform of the 
auxanometer) both hands of the observer are free and can 
be used in seeking the guiding-mark's and for maintaining 
the child in the position desired in the examination. It is 
also an advantageous condition for rapidity of execution. 

The auxanometer. — The instrument which I constructed 
suffices for all the measurements which the educator and the 
physician may have to take. It unites three instruments in 
a single one: the instrument for measuring vertical height, 
the instrument for measuring horizontal distance, and the 
large gauge. The instrument is taken to pieces in two parts. 
The upper part bears a scale on the side in inverse direction 
from the total graduation of the instrument, which allows 
of its being used as a large gauge. Three indicators receive 
some rods designed to come in contact with the guiding- 
marks. One of the indicators is fastened at the upper ex- 
tremity of instrument. It will form the hand-lever of the 
large gauge in measuring diameters. Of the two other in- 
dicators, the one is supplied on the inside with a spring in 
order to prevent its falling in vertical measurements. 

The base of the instrument is furnished with a sheath into 
which enters an iron rod itself soldered at its lower part to 
a square plate of the same metal; the rod enters a hole in 
the platform and the plate goes into a mortise of its dimen- 
sions sunk to the lower side of the platform. A shield, sur- 
mounted by a thumbscrew, is next passed over the rod in 
order to facilitate the movement of the rectangular part of 
the instrument around this axis, which presents at about 



Measurement of the Scholar 201 

midway a groove in which is secured a screw whose head 
emerges at the surface of the instrument. The tightening 
of this screw renders the instrument and the metaUic pivot 
firm without impeding the revolution of the rectangle around 
its axis. The base of the instrument is fastened in the same 
ways although horizontally to the support which is adjusted 
at will to one of the extremities of the platform, and permits 
horizontal measurements of a baby. The horizontal instru- 
ment is supported at the other extremity of the platform by 
a movable piece. A folding stool 30 centimeters in height 
completes the outfit which in its ensemble has received the 
name auxanometer from the educator and includes: (1) 
base of instrument, (2) top of instrument, (3) stationary 
indicator, (4) movable indicator with spring, (5) movable 
indicator without spring, (6) rod for the indicator with 
spring, (7) rod for stationary indicator, (8) rod for in- 
dicator without spring, (9) platform, (10) stay, (11) sup- 
port, (12) stool of 30 cm., (13) metal axis soldered to 
square iron plate, (14) metal sheath, (15) thumbscrew, 
(16) key, (17) measuring tape. 

The Broca caliper and the metal gauge are utilized only 
for the measuring of the cranium and the face. The educa- 
tor and the physician can replace them by the large gauge 
of the auxanometer which is easier to handle and is without 
danger for little children. 

A pencil unsheathed by boiling water, or a flat pencil, 
enables one to follow exactly the contour of the foot and of 
the hand according to Manouvrier's method. If one limits 
himself to two diameters of the foot and hand, he has re- 
course to the large gauge. But the contour is very quickly 
taken, and the graph obtained is a very sure record. 

Finally, a place is reserved for a pair of scales capable 
of weighing at least 80 kilos. 



202 Growth During School Age 

After being assured that the small instruments are at 
hand, in a way to be able to take them up mechanically, and 
so being distracted by nothing from the observation of the 
child, the observer placed as is directed above turning his 
back to the window and facing the child in full light, pro- 
ceeds to the measuring. He determines each guiding-mark, 
and, lowering or raising the indicator, he brings the rod in 
contact with the guiding-mark, the index finger of the left 
hand of the operator acting as scout or fore-runner, as well 
for assuring accuracy of the point of contact as for protect- 
ting the skin from the point of the metal rod or of the 
wooden rule which I have substituted for it for little chil- 
dren. 

Each number read on the instrument in hand is called 
aloud by the observer, and repeated aloud by the secretary, 
who writes it at the same time and immediately announces 
the rubric of the following measurement, so that the num- 
ber called aloud twice is better safeguarded against error. 

Care in checking up one^s self. — On the other hand, the ob- 
server realizes a valuable check, if he is ignorant of the 
figure obtained in the preceding examination when he takes 
the new measure. 

At the debut of each period of measuring, one identical 
subject ought to be measured two or three times, either the 
same day or at a day's interval, in order to check up at the 
same time the hand of the observer and the attention of the 
secretary, the attitude of the adolescent and the accuracy 
of the instruments. 

I have always taken great pride in having proceeded thus 
in the course of my measurements in the schools (1891- 
1901). These experiments presented besides the advantage 
of being very instructive from other points of view. 



Measurement of the Scholar 203 

The educator and the physician share in the care of taking 
the measurements and the notations of the individual record. 
By the individual medical record, the physician will con- 
tribute to the direction of education some information of 
the greatest importance. But if the educator is isolated, if 
he can assure his pupils the assistance of a physician only 
in case of illness, then he will do well to add to the measure- 
ments all the notations which he will be able to formulate 
with some guarantee of absolute accuracy. 

Working manual. Heights. — The body of the child being 
quite perpendicular, quite vertical, the observer places the 
rod of the indicator on the vertex of the subject whom he 
has had carefully seated on a stool 30 centimeters high ; the 
lower limbs apart and half extended; the body is straight- 
ened, a position which is obtained in all, small, large, cul- 
tured and uncultured, provided that one knows that the left 
hand must rest on the spiny prominences of the third and 
fourth lumbar vertebrae, while the right hand presses on the 
chin. The straightening is instantaneous and the height 
seated is taken with great accuracy. 

Directly this measure being called and recorded, the child 
is made to stand up, very erect, heels together but not quite 
touching and the toes spread. The rod then just touches 
the vertex where the hair has been parted. This gives the 
stature. 

The observer next places the point of the indicator rod 
at the point of the auditory canal represented by the cul- 
minating point of the antitragus. He rests the pointer on 
the semi-flat surface which the fork of the sternum (sternal 
furculum) presents, at the anterior base of the neck. From 
there, he lowers it to the pubis, whose superior edge at the 
median part is recognized in depressing a little the abdomi- 



204 Growth During School Age 

nal wall and besides is found very exactly marked by the 
cutaneous transversal fold which stripes the skin of the abdo- 
men at this point. 

The child is then turned three-quarters 'to the right (this 
change cannot be a cause of error owing to the platform of 
the auxanometer), and the height of the following guiding- 
marks is read: 

Acromion, at the sharp external edge of that process 
which forms the arch above the articulation of the shoulder, 
but is a little back of the prominence which the head of the 
humerus forms below. 

Medius, at the inferior extremity of the middle finger not 
including the nail, the hand well extended. 

The great trochanter, its superior edge, prominence sit- 
uated below the prominence of the hip, at the origin of the 
thigh, at the same height as the pubis, several millimeters 
approximately, outside. One recognizes it by placing both 
hands on the flat of the thighs at the middle part, then pass- 
ing the hands up and down while pressing down a little. 
During this time, the left hand stops the body from yield- 
ing to the pressure of the right, and the latter can follow 
thus the relief of the great femoral process and sinks as soon 
as the process ceases in the half-flat of the external iliac 
depression (fossa). The left index finger is placed on the 
crest of the trochanter in order to guide the point of the 
indicator with precision. 

Another way of proceeding in order to mark the great 
trochanter is the following: the radial edges of the two 
index fingers are rested on the right and left hips (iliac 
crests) of the subject observed. The indexes cross this 
obstacle and descend while depressing the tissues until the 
meeting of the trochanter prominence which seems closer to 
the posterior plane of the thigh. 



Measurement of the Scholar 205 

Diameters, — Following height, it is in order to measure 
the diameters. The diameters taken directly measure thick- 
ness and breadth. The vertical diameters, which are some 
measures of length, are obtained by the subtraction of two 
heights. One of them, however, is taken directly. This is 
the vertical diameter of the cranium. 

The antero-posterior chest diameter is taken at the level 
of the lower extremity of the sternum, which is easily found 
at the summit of the angle formed by the inferior convergent 
edges of the thoracic cage, in front. Plate XV. 

One of the indicators of the large gauge is applied tan- 
gentially to the base of the last bone of the sternum, the 
other one to the prominence of the spinal process which it 
meets in the same plane. 

The other diameter of the thorax, the transverse, is taken 
at the same xiphoi-sternal height (Plate XV), the two indi- 
cators of the large gauge resting on the costal convexities 
and binding a trifle. The first time, the diameter is noted 
when the child is at rest, that is, respires quietly. The 
second time it is noted when the child has drawn a deep 
breath and the thoracic cage is expanded to the maximum. 
It may be useful to take a third diameter just as one of 
you asked me, the transverse diameter at the moment when 
the lungs are in forced expiration. It requires, it is true, 
on the part of the child, a certain degree of physical culture 
and a special preparation without which he would execute 
badly the movement of thoracic expulsion. 

To the head, Broca's caliper will be applied in front, 
almost at the center of the forehead, above the arches of 
the eyebrows, between the frontal mounds (bosses) ; behind, 
the other arm will seek the most salient part of the occipital 
convexity in the same antero-posterior plane. This is the 
antero-posterior frontal diameter. 



206 Growth During School Age 

The transversal diameter is taken at the maximum, that is, 
where the compass is open widest in the horizontal plane, 
higher or lower above the auricle of the ear ; farther for- 
ward or farther backward according to the individual. 

As to the vertical diameter, which represents the distance 
between the center of the auditory canal and the vertex, it 
is measured by the steel gauge with its indicator rod taken 
off. Its stationary horizontal arm is placed on the top of 
the cranium, the hair being put aside, the graduated arm 
descends tangentially to the temples ; the greatest care is 
taken of the vertical direction of the descending arm which 
must be parallel to the axis of the body, then the figure 
corresponding to the point of the antitragus is read on the 
scale. 

Circumferences. — The circumferences are interesting 
measurements because they give some information on the 
thickness of the various parts of the body. Their disadvan- 
tage is to vary greatly for a very small difference of level, 
as well for the limbs as for the trunk. 

For the limbs, that is remedied by taking the maximum 
circumference. It is a matter of raising and lowering the 
tape measure until there is certainty of the maximum figure, 
and it is that which is recorded. The same holds for the 
minimum circumference, which avoids an error of the same 
kind. It requires the same care to determine exactly the 
smallest circumference, a fact that necessitates several trials 
at different heights. 

The minimum circumference of the forearm is located 
above the prominences of the inferior part of the two bones 
of the forearm, the radius and ulna. The wrist is below 
these prominences, between them and the hand. 

The rubric, "circumference of the wrist," does not fit. It 
is the "minimum circumference of the forearm" which we 



m 



Measurement of the Scholar 207 

ought to keep as the designation of that measurement, of 
so much greater importance as it furnishes us the thickness 
of the bones. Now the bones of the forearm, in the child, 
are not perceptibly larger at the superior third of the fore- 
arm, at the level of the belly of the muscles. So that the 
difference between their circumference, or the minimum cir- 
cumference of the forearm, and the circumference of the 
muscles or maximum girth of the forearm gives us very 
accurate information on the thickness of the muscles. 

Immediately below the elbow, where the forearm is shown 
to be largest, is found the maximum circumference of this 
segment. 

The investigation of maxima and minima is applicable to 
the circumferences of the trunk in only an approximate 
fashion. 

It is satisfactory to take the thoracic perimeters at the 
anatomical point recommended without investigating the 
maximum and minimum thickness. The horizontal position 
of the tape measure is carefully watched. For the one 
measurement, the tape will pass tight against the edge of 
the armpits, and will supply the circumference under the 
armpits. For the other, more specially called "thoracic 
perimeter," the tape will be passed around the body at the 
height at which the chest diameters were taken, that is, at 
the level of the inferior extremity of the sternum, described 
above. 

Unfortunately, in children especially, the sternum is still 
very short and the tape meets at the back the inferior angles 
of the shoulder blades (or scapulum) and passes bridgelike 
from one to the other in order to cross the median furrow 
which corresponds to the spine processes of the spinal 
column. 

There is in these anatomical conditions an important cause 



208 Growth During School Age 

of error. The error is here rendered more serious by this 
fact that it cannot be evaluated by a constant figure, per- 
mitting rigid correction of it; it varies at each repetition 
of the measurement. It is further accentuated at the time 
of puberty as a result of the "winged" disposition which 
the shoulder blades often take, and as a result of the volume 
which the breasts in young girls take on. These various 
morphological conditions necessarily disturb the measure- 
ment of the circumference of the chest already so uncertain. 

You understand, do you not, my tendency to take only 
very relative account of the thoracic perimeter, and to re- 
quire of the diameters the reliable information which the 
circumferences cannot give unless they are multiplied and 
surrounded by numerous other measurements as they are in 
my researches.? 

Contour of the hand and of the foot. — It may be that 
you have not the desired facilities to take the contour of the 
hand and of the foot after the excellent method of Manouv- 
rier; it is in that case that you will have to limit yourself 
to the measurement of the length and breadth of each of 
these two organs by means of the gauge (compas-glissieres), 
the hand, like the foot, resting flat on a plane surface. I 
call to your attention the guiding-marks analysed above at 
the time of the study of the skeleton ; for the foot, from the 
heel to the extremity of the longest toe, for the hand, 
from point of styloid processes of the radius, which corre- 
sponds almost in all to the wrinkle of the bending of the 
skin on the anterior face of the wrist, to the extremity of 
the longest finger. As to the breadths, these are the articu- 
lar heads of the fifth and the first metatarsus in the foot, 
of the second and fifth metacarpus in the hand which con- 
stitute the guiding-marks. 

I know that you do not treat these repetitions as negli- 



Measurement of the Scholar 209 

gible tautologies and that you are seizing, with your avidity 
of knowing all that is useful to the child, these notions which, 
thanks to our objective, are directly connected to function, 
and have nothing of the usual dryness of anatomical notions. 
And it is because you have many times testified your willing- 
ness to know the child not superficially, but as profoundly 
as possible, it is on that account that I do not hesitate to 
recur apropos the working manual to the important guiding- 
marks. 

As to contours, you will obtain excellent ones by taking 
the following steps : the hand is placed flat, the palm resting 
on the table, a sheet of paper between. The fingers are ex-, 
tended close together, except the thumb which keeps its nat- 
ural distance. The middle finger is kept on the prolongation 
of the axis of the forearm which remains slightly raised. 

With the flat pencil, or the round pencil unsheathed by 
passing it a few minutes into boiling water, the two extremi- 
ties of the wrinkle of the bend on the palm side of the wrist 
are marked; or, if one does not desire to have a difference 
often harmful, embarrassing, between the length of the hand 
measured in projection and the length of the hand measured 
on the contour, one marks of the two transversal lines the 
points of the styloid processes of the radius and ulna. The 
pencil remaining vertical, traverse next the contour of the 
hand resting continually its flat surface against the tegu- 
ments. Next, one separates the fingers one by one except 
the medius which must remain the fixed axis, and one makes 
a point at the bottom of each interdigital space. 

It is a decided advantage to trace on the external and 
internal edges, as many transversal, exterior lines to the 
contour as one perceives articular interlines or extremities 
of bony processes. 

One proceeds in the same fashion for the foot; the con- 



210 Growth During School Age 

tour is registered with a flat pencil after having marked by 
two transversal lines the middle of both ankles. It is neces- 
sary not to fail to follow at each new examination the same 
procedure as at the preceding examinations. It is obvious 
that the form of the foot is anatomically more exact, if the 
weight of the body does not bear on the foot observed. I 
have always had the weight of the body rest on both feet, 
as in the regular standing position, during the taking of the 
contour of each of them, so as to have the foot in its func- 
tional state, w^th its dimensions in the condition of working, 
as the standing position presents them for each of the body's 
segments. 

Weight of the body. — ^At the head of the individual rec- 
ord card figures weight. It suffices to know that the weight 
ought always to be taken without clothing. 

The process of weighing the child dressed, then the sub- 
traction of the weight of the clothes weighed afterwards 
separately, is hardly acceptable for the nursling whom one 
fears to have take cold. It is quite to be rejected for large 
children. 

This is the way of operating the measurements of a given 
child, which will always have to be observed, stripped of 
clothing, supplied at the most with bathing pants. 



CHAPTER IX 

NOTATIONS TO BE RECORDED ON THE INDIVIDUAL RECORD CARD 

OF GROWTH 

Physiological and clinical setting of the measurements. — 
The alternations of growth and the semestral period. — 
Notations to be taken on the child stripped. — Notations 
to be taken on the child when dressed, among them color 
of eyes and of hair. — Temperament. — Relation of the 
duration of repose to the duration of effort. 

PHYSIOLOGICAL and clinical setting of the measure- 
ments. — Measurements would give only incomplete in- 
struction and would be of a limited utility if they were 
isolated. They always need a physiological and clinical 
setting, and the end of the notations is to constitute this 
setting for them. Among them some are to be taken only 
once, others are to be repeated half-yearly. The semester 
is in fact the most practical period and the best suited to 
the physiological exigencies of observation. 

The most of the alternations, I believe I have demonstrated 
above, can be grasped by the semestral repetition of the 
observation. Doubtless, when the child is still a baby, it is 
interesting to follow him more closely, but that matters more 
for the direction of his health than for that of his education 
properly called, and the physician will advise in regard to it. 
The semestral period is always sufficient at the age at which 
the child attends school. 

For each of the notations which the educator is called 

211 



21S Growth During School Age 

upon to take down, I wish to indicate the most practical and 
rapid mode of evaluation, and yet the most capable to enter 
with the maximum of precision into the "individual for- 
mula," at the time of its being made up. 

Notations to he taken on the child stripped. — The child 
being naked, his "ensemble" is evaluated from the first, and 
noted by the means of two qualifications: large, medium, 
small, to which are added stout, puny, massive, slender, 
strapping, etc. 

This notation of ensemble thus extended serves from time 
to time to illuminate various other notations ; it is besides 
usefully representative. As the ensemble can be modified 
with progress of growth, the individual card will reserve 
for this estimate as for all those which are going to follow, 
the same number of columns as for the measurements. 

The "present malady" is to be registered accordirts^ to 
the diagnosis of the physician. Likewise, it belongs to the 
physician to diagnose the signs of the general malady, lim- 
ited or acquired, the symptoms of nervous affection, present 
or threatening nervous troubles. 

The master will recognize perfectly and will note with 
the greatest care scars of wounds, traces of blows, of bruises, 
discolored spots, caused by the effusion of blood into the 
areolar tissue, or spots violet, bluish, greenish or yellow, 
their location and their cause with the time when the wound 
was received. 

The remote consequences of traumatisms are not suffi- 
ciently known. It suffices to follow the same children, ob- 
serving them carefully through years in order to understand 
the whole interest which is attached to intelligent first aid 
of an even slight injury. 

You can always note the asymmetries which will strike 
you, those of the face in particular. The physician will 



Individual Record Card of Growth 213 

also note on his part the defects of symmetry having correla- 
tions with various circumstances which his clinical examina- 
tions will bring out. 

The rubric "additional details," where the asymmetries 
can be entered, is designed for remarks which found no place 
elsewhere. 

Deformations are the modifications which come in the 
course of growth such as deviations. Nevertheless the mal- 
formations are defects of organic construction which the 
child bears at birth. 

You will be able to estimate the general muscular relief, 
and for that reason you will have to distinguish the promi- 
nences formed by adipose tissue. A child may present re- 
liefs on the calves, on the arms, and possess only very slender 
muscles. These curves of the surface of the body which 
imitate the muscular relief are observed in children of the 
female sex* especially, but also in very young boys, and in 
those who remain more or less effeminate. 

It is necessary to distinguish with certainty the "embon- 
point" from the "muscular relief," and that is not learned 
theoretically. 

Let us leave to the physician the care of ascertaining the 
relative development of the genital organs. 

You will always be able to note the absence or the exist- 
ence of hair under the arm, in default of verification of the 
appearance of it at the pubis, and you will take care to 
indicate its abundance by the figures from 1 to 5, the figure 
1 corresponding to the appearance of the first hairs. 

The clinical examination comes next, which is quite en- 
tirely in the medical domain. You will record only when the 
physician and the family communicate it to you, the results 
of the clinical examination in what concerns the general con- 
dition; that by reason of the precautions which it necessi- 



214 Growth During School Age 

tates or of its influence on the intellectual condition and its 
development. You will also have to take account of the 
visual and auditory defects pointed out by the technical 
examination. You will add only to the preceding notes be- 
fore having the subject resume his clothing, some indications 
on the color of the skin, on its coloring and on its thickness. 

Notations to he taken on the child when dressed. — When 
the child is dressed, you will be able to attend to the record- 
ing on the individual record card of growth, the permanent 
information, those details which stand at the head, from sur- 
name and given name to personal antecedents and to mal- 
formations. 

You will continue next to note the variable data, the part 
of these data which can be taken on the child clothed, and 
which reserve for you the most delicate observations illu- 
minated henceforth by the knowledge which you have just 
acquired. 

The variations of the timber of the voice, of its pitch, the 
details attending the change, merit mention, as well as the 
condition of the teeth (good, 3; poor, 1 ; average, 2). 

Before approaching the evaluation of "force" under its 
various aspects, if it should appear profitable to you to note 
the color of the hair and the changes which are produced in 
it, but especially the color of the eyes, I desire to indicate to 
you the process of observation to which I have had recourse 
in my researches which have assured me a real precision, 
and rendered very attractive the determination of the color 
of the eyes. I transcribe this passage from my work, 
"Recherches anthropometriques sur la croissance des diverses 
parties du corps," 1902-03. ["Anthropometric Researches 
on the Growth of Divers Parts of the Body," 1902-03.] 

Color of the eyes. — "Contrary to what has taken place 
for capillary coloration, the tint of the iris which is that of 



Individual Record Card of Growth 215 

the eyes, becomes lighter in 45 per cent of children at the 
approach of puberty. It becomes darker in only 18 per 
cent. 

"... On the whole, in 63 per cent of adolescents, one 
observes, at the time of puberty, a modification of the primi- 
tive coloration of both eyes, while 37 per cent retain the 
same coloration. . , . 

"... Sometimes it is a matter of reduction to a single 
color of the complex primitive coloration, as is found in 23 
per cent. Sometimes the change consists only in a modifica- 
tion of the first coloration. 

"... The method of observation which I have marked 
out, recognizes at the surface of the iris, of the eye, the 
small and the large circle: the first peripupillary, inscribed 
in the second, of constantly homogeneous color, and almost 
constantly of a darker shade than the large circle from 
which it is often separated by a border of variable color. 

"The large circle, extended from the limits of the first to 
the border of the cornea, of complex coloration, almost al- 
ways, as a result of combination of the retro-iris (uvea) 
pigment with the pigment developed in the very woof of the 
tissue of the iris, or again, from the only pigment of that 
woof, composed of grain of different shades, of which some 
form the dark tint, and others affect some varied disposi- 
tions which can all be traced back to the four following 
forms : stripes, spots, speckles, dots." So much for the color 
of the eyes. 

Color of the hair. — As to the color of the hair, it is to be 
mentioned without details : red, blond, chestnut, black, with 
the qualifications light or dark; for it changes in 28 per 
cent of children. The colors which are modified, are: the 
dark chestnut 14 per cent, blond 8 per cent, light chestnut 
4 per cent, chestnut 1 per cent, and light red 1 per cent. 



216 Growth During School Age 

The colors acquired were black 15 per cent, dark chestnut 
6 per cent, light chestnut 2 per cent, chestnut 2 per cent, 
dark red 1 per cent ; two boys recovered after puberty the 
color of hair which they had before its dawn, having under- 
gone a temporary darkening during the evolution of germen 
and soma. 

In a general fashion, puberty darkens the color of the 
hair and renders lighter the color of the eyes. 

It seems to me that these considerations which I had de- 
veloped in 1902 were of a nature to interest you and that 
they merited being presented to you more fully than I had 
done it apropos of puberal influences. 

Possessing so simple a method of observation, you can 
practice at will the determination of the color of the eyes, 
and you will arrive at a veritable mastery in that reading 
from which your educator's ingenuity can very well draw 
profitable pedagogical effects. 

Besides, these changes of color of the eyes are not without 
physiological and psychological correlations which you will 
discover yourselves. 

Strength. — Let him exercise himself at play, or in some 
sport, let him wrestle, let him fence, let him take part in 
gymnastics under any one of its forms, tlie child will mani- 
fest the absence or the presence of these three physical quali- 
ties : strength, agility (and elasticity, relaxation) and re- 
sistence or relation of duration of effort to duration of 
repose. 

The poorest procedure of evaluation of strength is cer- 
tainly the dynamometric test whose results are so different 
according as the child is left to himself or as he is under 
the influence of a motive of emulation or of stimulation, or 
again, according as the springs exercise directly their hard 
pressure on the palm side of the metacarpo-phalangic articu- 



Individual Record Card of Growth ^17 

lations, or as this pressure is softened by the interposition 
of a band of padding. 

The results finally vary in such proportions between the 
first trial and that of the eighth day of methodical practice 
that one is forced to recognize that the figure obtained, in 
submitting a child once from time to time to the test of the 
dynamometer, does not represent his absolute strength nor 
his relative strength. 

I propose to you to conclude that a systematic practicing 
must, as for all other gymnastic exercises, moreover, precede 
the test of the dynamometer, a fact of which mention ought 
to be made on the individual record card. The other proc- 
esses of estimating strength answer to some general qualities 
less localized. 

Temperament. — Temperament has been studied master- 
fully by Professor Manouvrier in his lessons at PEcole 
d'Anthropologie de Paris. This teacher has had the sub- 
stance of his lessons published in the Revue Mensuelle de 
I'Ecole d'Anthropologie, numbers of December 15, 1896, and 
of June 15, 1898. 

Manouvrier considers the temperaments as being repre- 
sented by the various degrees of nervous potentiality. He 
distinguishes three degrees ; the superior or sthenic tempera- 
ment, the medium or mesosthenic temperament, and the in- 
ferior or hyposthenic temperament. 

He estimates that its evaluation must be reduced to the 
simple appreciation of the degree of nervous energy mani- 
fested in certain acts or in the ensemble of the acts of the 
individuals examined. 

We note then the expenditure of energy from 1 to 5, 
according to the advice of Manouvrier: 3 represents aver- 
age energy, 5 superior energy, 1 inferior energy; 2 and 4 
represent energies very near the average, but which emerge, 



218 Growth During School Age 

4 with a certain superiority, 2 with a relative inferiority. 
It is thus that since 1893 I have evaluated the quality of 
energy of the scholars observed at the Ecoles des Andelys, 
then at St.-Hippolyte-du-Fort, where 300 children had been 
called more or less energetic, not only according to the in- 
formation furnished concerning them, but especially accord- 
ing to direct observation of their activity in recreation, on 
promenade, at military exercise, at gymnastics, and even in 
class. Each semester added its estimate to the preceding, 
and I can follow today step by step the modifications of 
energy contributed by age, growth, education, environment. 
As elsewhere the variations of these various influences have 
been noted periodically at the same time as the results of 
the anatomical, physiological and clinical examination, the 
organic correlations of each appear in proportion to the 
working up of them. 

I have seen thus constructed the "individual formula" 
which does not represent a conception more or less happy 
on my part, but derives from these correlations of facts. 

After evaluation of temperament, the educator will note a 
certain number of manners of being whose combination with 
temperament can put on the scent of character, this com- 
plex synthesis which has not yet been able to be done in a 
definitive fashion. 

It is in this direction that the educator will get informa- 
tion from the parents on the disposition of the child on his 
awaking; is he sad and taciturn? is he smiling, talkative? is 
he sulky, authoritative? Indifferent mood will be evaluated 
8. If it be sulky, one will record 1 ; sad, it merits 2. If the 
disposition is on the contrary smiling, it will be numbered 4, 
and it will merit 5 if it shows itself exuberantly cheerful. 



Individual Record Card of Growth S19 

Relation of duration of repose to duration of effort.' — 
The educator will specify his general estimate of intelli- 
gence I, evaluating it from 1 to 5, the figure 5 always mark- 
ing the highest degree of intellect. Memory can be eval- 
uated separately by the educator, or be joined to I accord- 
ing to the personal manner of considering the question. 

A expresses the alternation, the relation - -? that is, the 

relation of the duration of repose to the duration of effort. 
The value of r and the value of e represent some averages 
of multiple evaluations taken at various times of the day in 
the course of the different manifestations of the child's ac- 
tivity, somatic (As) and intellectual (Ac). 

Meanwhile, you have noted the average conduct of the 
semester, the average attention. 

And now, the individual formula demands of you some 
calculation destined to furnish the elements which you may 
need while working at constructing it, but already, by them- 
selves, the results of these calculations instruct you usefully 
on the length of each of the four grand consecutive seg- 
ments of height, on the length of the limbs, and of the seg- 
ments of the limbs, on the length of the bust, on the volume 
of the cranium, on the volume of the trunk, on the total 
length of the limbs, the superior added to the inferior, on 
the volume of the musculature, on the respirational spacious- 
ness. 

These calculations are limited to some simple operations 
of arithmetic, subtraction, addition, multiplication, and 
division. 

For the educator, each of these results is eloquent and 
representative from the viewpoint of function and of the 
conditions of individuality. So, these calculations once 



220 Growth During School Age 

made, he will find himself absolutely prepared to construct 
the individual formula and to interpret it with certainty, 
with precision in the direction of putting in relief of the 
somatic individuality, in the direction of the individualiza- 
tion of the direction of education.. 



CHAPTER X 

DETERMINATION OF "sOMATIC INDIVIDUALITY*' BY THE "INDI- 
VIDUAL formula" of growth ^ 

The individual formula of growth and somatic individuality, 
— The individual formula aims at fu/nction. — Make-up 
of the individual formula. — Its interpretation. 

THE individual formula of growth and somatic individ- 
uality. — The somatic individuality of which we have 
just given the elements in detail, is, in some sort, synthesized 
at each moment of growth by the "individual formula of 
growth." By studying the make-up of this formula we shall 
grasp the usefulness of our harvest ; and we shall see the 
various interpretations of which each of the factors of the 
individual formula is susceptible. 

The individual formula takes as terms of comparison the 
volumes of the cranium and of the trunk; the first, because 
it causes to intervene as factor the capacity of the reservoir 
of potential energy which is also the center of the "harmoni- 
zations"; the other, because it represents the volume of the 
reservoir in which are found united the viscera which their 
role designates as transformer-distributors. 

The individual formula aims at function. — It is that, in 
fact, the individual formula of growth, through anatomical 
conditions and relations, refers to the functional relations, 
such as those of the visceral segments between themselves, 

^ See La Formule indwidiielle de Croissance. Guide for parents, the 
physician, and the educator. A. Maloine, pub., Paris, 1913, 

221 



222 Growth During ScJiool Age 

the functional relations of these with the alimentary tract 
from the viewpoint of nutrition and energy. 

The trunk and the cranium are containers, cases inclos- 
ing the viscera. It is of importance, consequently, to esti- 
mate their volume. Doubtless their irregular form per- 
mits only an approximate estimate ; neither of these two 
cases has, in effect, one of those definite forms of which cal- 
culation determines the exact capacity. Multiplication of 
breadth by depth and of the product by the height will then 
not give us their true cubic content. When we use, for 
want of others, the expression, to cube, we do not have the 
pretension of effecting an absolute cubing. We shall seek 
only and shall obtain relative to the volume of their con- 
tent, an approximate evaluation which, calculated with the 
same elements in the various subjects or in the same child 
at the successive phases of growth, will render the compari- 
son possible and the observed differences extremely instruct- 
ive; and this is what we must do. 

The previous division by a common figure, 3, of all the 
numbers which have to enter in line for the calculations 
does not change their relative value at all, and it has the 
advantage of reducing the quantity of the figures with con- 
sequent simplification of calculations. 

The make-up of the individual formula and its interpreta- 
tion from viewpoint of education. — The trunk answers to 
the transformer-distributor viscera. The digestive appara- 
tus transforms the alimentary substances into nutritive sub- 
stances ; the pulmonary apparatus transforms the venous 
blood into arterial; the chyliferous vessels distribute to the 
blood the transformed aliments, the lymphatic vessels come 
to bathe the tissues, the distribution of the blood is performed 
by the heart, etc. 

The trunk is cubed by the product of the multiplication 



Somatic Individuality amd Individual Formula 223 

of its three dimensions, transverse, antero-posterior, and 
vertical (this last measured by the distance from the sternal 
fork (furculum) to pubis or to great trochanter). The 
product of this double multiplication is called V (Viscera). 

V varies enormously from birth to adult age and it is ex- 
pressed by a different figure at each of the stages of growth, 
at each of the successive semesters. 

It is the same with the product C of the double multi- 
plication of the diameters of the cranium, of which the con- 
tent is the encephelon, the brain, consequently. 

The relation of C to V gives a quotient which instructs 
us on the relative proportions of the viscera of the vege- 
tative life and of those of the psychic life, as well as on the 
functional relations of nutritive order between the brain and 
the soma. 

The quotient informs the educator of the free field which 
the individual vegetative resources for cerebral culture leave 
to him; it warns him in good time to have to suppress that 
culture which is given to it at school, and to replace it by 
an objective culture with the participation of the body; 
namely, agricultural labor or, in its default, apprenticeship 
in a trade, as Rousseau recommended; and that, until the 
organism has acquired some more powerful vegetative re- 
sources, or at least more educative resources. 

C 
The quotient of the relation -- at the time of puberty, 

goes from 20 to 23 in the average child well-balanced and 
regular. There is there also a valuable warning for the 
educator. 

There is more ; the quotient in question, which is 74 in the 
new-born, advances according to a definite progression to- 
ward this average figure 20 to 23. So that, according to its 
value, one can estimate in a very close way the distance 



224 Growth During School Age 

which still separates the child from the dawn of his puberty. 
In order to appreciate, as deserved, information of this 
order, it suffices for us to recall what growth has taught 
us touching the "educative moment" of the brain. In mak- 
ing known to the educator the time which must elapse be- 
fore the dawn of puberty, the individual formula of growth, 

C 

the relation of — especially, permits him to estimate the 

time which he has to dispose of for the prepuberal culture 
of the brain. 

— is to be employed in regard to the evaluation of energy 

of temperament, in regard to the potentiality whose pov- 
erty or richness it can sometimes explain. 

As to the expenditure of energy, to its rapidity or slow- 
ness, to the importance of the "debit of energy of the child," 
the educator finds in the relation to V, of another size O 
(ossature, i.e., skeleton) a very suggestive indication of 
some inhibitive or auxiliary causes. 

O represents the total length of the superior members 
added to the total length of the inferior members. This is 
then a linear dimension ; and, in certain respects, it may 
appear singular that it should be taken for numerator of a 
fraction whose denominator is a volume. But let it not be 
forgotten that we are here considering function and no 
longer only the anatomical notion. The distributing func- 
tion of the visceral trunk is by so much the more laborious 
as the limbs are longer. The variations of their volume due 
to causes other than fat have only a little influence on the 
work of the distributor; the length has, on the contrary, a 
direct influence, which is interpreted in a precise fashion in 
the child by the feebleness, the apathy, the fatigableness of 
the whole organism with repercussion on the ergogenetic 
function of the nerve centers. 



Somatic Individuality and Individual Formula 225 

^ enlightens us on the relative proportions of the total 

length of the limbs and of the trunk, or, if you wish, on the 
relation of the trunk to the branches of the human tree. 

This quotient instructs us on the probable somatic possi- 
bilities. It shows us from what activity of nutrition the 
motor outfit properly called is provided. It designates for 
physical education the part of the organism upon which 
strength-producing action, developing culture must bear. 
The educator knows, by himself, the extent of the deficit to 

be made up: if already the relation 5 has demonstrated 
for us the insufficiency of the child's trunk compared to the 
average child in his class, and that 2 confirms this no- 
tion in showing us the deficit of the trunk in function of the 
limbs, there is no hesitation possible, it is on the trunk that 
the solicitude of physical culture must bear, seconded by a 
combined action on the limbs themselves. 

The educator is warned by the two relations _ and 5 

V V 

of the individual formula which designate to him the point 

on which his action must bear; it is for him to act in con- 
formity with this warning if he intends above all to safe- 
guard the regular physical development of the child, if the 
family leaves him free in his direction of education and if 
this latter be understood as it ought to be. 

Enlightened by the individual formula of growth, one 
feels how far the progress of a general culture is prudent 
and advisable, one inquires into and understands the state- 
ment of the applications of education, of pedagogy on 
some points also clearly pointed out. 

Soon, the direction thus inspired reaps some encouraging 
results, education does not delay to have the figures in the 



226 Growth During School Age 

quotient changed in the desirable direction ; the transformer- 
distributor gains in volume, and the limbs no more lengthen 
only moderately; so that, by degrees, the disproportion is 
wiped out. 

In order to simplify the preceding calculations, I remind 
you that I divide all the numbers by the same figure, 3, an 
operation which does not change their relative value at all. 

The muscular development is given by the difference be- 
tween the minimum circumference of the forearm and the 
maximum circumference of the same segment. This means 
that, in effect, from the apparent volume of the muscular 
mass of a limb are to be subtracted the volume of the con- 
nective tissue and that of the osseous tissue. The minimum 
circumference of the forearm equals in an approximate 
fashion the volume of the connective and osseous tissues. 
In deducting it from the greatest thickness offered by the 
forearm, one obtains for difference the thickness of the anti- 
brachial muscular mass, with its vessels, its nerves and cuta- 
neous tissues. 

The letter M which expresses it can be considered as rep- 
resenting the muscular volume in function of the osseous 

volume and — , the lever power in function of the length of 

the arms. 

The educator has, in fact, as first duty to maintain the 
equilibrium in V, M, C, a condition of the stability and of 
the power decreed to the individual, with maintenance of 
the necessary resources for procreative action. 

If one inquires into the respiratory amplitude as the 
thoracic amplitude construes it in inspiration, one obtains 
R by subtracting from the transverse diameter of the thorax 
in inspiration the transverse diameter of the thorax in re- 
pose. 



Somatic Individwality and Individual Formula 227 

One obtains equally a value of R by subtracting the 
xiphisternal thoracic circumference in repose from the same 
in inspiration. 

In order to avoid all confusion in the work of comparison, 
we shall call the first Rd and the second Rp. 

I am continuing to investigate Rp, in order to permit a 
comparison of the new results with the mass of the preced- 
ing, with the figures of the average child at each age, but 
I do not neglect the diameters in inspiration, measures to 
which I urge you to limit yourselves for the anatomical rea- 
sons which I set forth to you above. 

The value of R lends itself to various considerations, all 
of which offer a live interest for the educator. However, 
R (amplitude of respiration) can not rank on the same plane 
as the preceding notions in the individual formula, because 
it implies the intervention of the subject, of his good will, 
as does the spirometer test. There results from it some un- 
certainty in the estimation of this value and a necessary 
reserve in its utilization. 

Let us note, however, that the averages calculated on a 
great number of particular cases permit the affirming of the 
lowering of the rate of respiration, of R after puberty. 
This fact is susceptible of various interpretations which the 
educator ought also to be enabled to consider. Does the 
reduction of amplitude, of R, on the morrow of puberty ex- 
press a reduction of the activity of respiration.? In a cer- 
tain measure there is, in effect, a reduction of the activity 
of respiration comparatively to the prepuberal activity. 

But the largest part of the diminution of R appears to 
answer to the production of another phenomenon, namely, 
the "change of direction of the increasing amplitude of the 
lungs," which, from transverse before puberty, becomes ver- 
tical after it. 



228 Growth During School Age 

The educator needs to check this functioning and this 
substitution, because the position seated contributes an ob- 
stacle to the play of the diaphragm, to the forcing back 
by it of the abdominal viscera. 

As, likewise, in the sitting posture, the position of the 
superior limbs of the scholar, and the incurvature of the 
spinal column injure the transverse thoracic amplitude, there 
is in reality an obstacle in both directions to a sufficient pul- 
monary amplitude, and it may be that the consequent re- 
duction at puberty is, in part, imputable to these school 
circumstances. 

R is to be followed by the educator, but especially on ac- 
count of indication and of warning. There is reason to 
check it by the correlative anatomico-physiological notions 
and to observe the manner of behavior of each child rela- 
tive to this value of R and its variations. 

The way is open now to all of you who give yourselves 
sincerely to the observation of the child, to verify the de- 
ductions which precede and to multiply the useful applica- 
tions of the results which the auxanological method fur- 
nishes. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY ^ 

FOR bibliography up to 1901 see "Recherches Anthropo- 
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Paris, 1902-3. 

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— Les Maladies familiales. Paris, 1906. 

Bardleben ( K. VON ) : Weitere Untersuchungen ilber Links- 
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— (K. V.) : Statik u. Mechanik des menschlichen Korpers. 
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Bianco: Enfants de Madrid. Revue de I'Hypnot. Fev., 
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BoNCOUR (PAiJii) : Anthropologie anatomique. Paris, 1911. 

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BuscHAN (Dr. Georges) : MenscJienkunde. Ausgemdhlte 
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Butte: Du role du medecin scolarie dans V education phy- 
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Chaillou et Mac Auliffe : Morphologie medicale. Paris, 
1911. 

Capitan: Cas d'arret de developpement. Medecine mod- 
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* See appendix to Bibliography, page 236. 

229 



230 Bibliography 

Chantre: Nomhreuses communications. Bulletin de la 

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CoLLiGNON (Dr. R.): Etude anthropometrique des princi- 

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Bihliography 231 

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Zurich, 1906. 
Houssaye: La Morphologie dynamique. Paris, 1910. 
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232 Bibliography 

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1911. 
Meige : art., Gigantisme duV M. C, 
Mollison: Die Korperproportionen der Primaten. Mor- 

phologisches Jahrbuch B. XLII. H. 1/2. 
Nicolas: Anatomie descriptive. Nouvelle edition (de 

TAnatomie de Poirier, Charpy et Nicolas). Paris, 

1912. 
Papillault: Vhomme moyen a Paris. Bulletins et Me- 

moires de la Societe d'Anthropol. de Paris, 1902. 
PiTTARD ET Theraz : Momdihule et dents en fonction de la 

capacite crdnienne. Cong. A. F. A. S. Lyon, 1906. 
PiTTARD ET Lagotala : Les Kurdes. Bull, de la Soc. Rou- 

maine des Sc. Bucharest, 1911. 
Ploss, H. : Das Kind in Branch und Sitte der Volker. Leip- 
zig, 1911. 
Ploetz (Dr. a.) : Travaux divers in Archiv. f. Rassen u. 

Gesellschafts Biologie. Leipzig. 
Poutrin: Contribution a V etude des Pygmees d'Afrique. 

T. XXII, p. 421, et T. XXIII, p. 349. L'Anthro- 

pologie, 1911. 
Prenant : La substance hereditaire et la base cellulaire de 

Vheredite in Journ. de I'Anat. et de la Physiolog. No. 

1, 1911. 
Ranke, J. : Der Mensch B. I. Entwickelung, Bau u. Leben 

des menschlichen Korpers. Leipzig, 1911. 
Reche (Dr. 0.) : Untersuchungen ilber Wachstum u. 

Geschlechtsreife bei Melanesischen Kindern. Hom- 

burg Archiv. Anthrop., 1910. 



234 Bibliograpliy 

RiccARDi: Circonferenza toracica e statura, etc. Pavie, 

1887. 
Rivet : Recherches sur le prognathisme. L'Anthropologie 

T. XXI., No. 6. 
ScHMiD-MoNNARD : Ucber den Einfluss der Jahreszeit u. 

der ScJiule auf das Wachstum der Kinder. Jahresber. 

f. Kinderheilkunde, 1895. 
ScHMiD-KuNz : Die oheren Stufen des Jugendalters. Congr. 

Kinderforsch. Berlin, 1906. 
ScHWERZ (Dr. Franz): VersucJi einer Anthropologisch. 

Monograph, des Kantons SchafFhausen. Denkscrif- 

ten der Schweiz. Naturforschenden Gesellschaft, B. 

XLV. 
ScHWERz (Dr. Franz) : Untersuchungen ilher das Wach- 
stum des Menschen. Arch. f. Anthropol. N. Folge. 

B. X., p. 1 a 38. 
— Ueher das Wachstum des Menschen. Bern, 1912. 
Sergi: Origine et expansion de la race mediterraneenne. 

Leipzig, 1897. 
Signorelli: II diametra vertebrale. Atti Societa Romana 

Anthropol., 1908. Vol. 14, pp. 219-238. 
Stier, E. : Studien ilher Linkshdndigkeit . Monatschrift 

Psychiatrie u. Neurologic, B. 25., H. 5. 
Stratz : Wachstum u. Proportionen des Menschen vor. u. 

n. der Geburt. 
— Wachstum u. Proportionen des Foetus. Zeitschrift 

Geburts u. Gynakologie. 
— Atavismus des menschlichen Ohres. 
— Ueher die Normalgestalt des Menschen. 6 fig. 
— Grosse u. Proportionen der menschlichen Rassen in 

Arch. Anthropol. N. Folge. B. 8 et B. 10. 
Testut: Traite d'Anatomie humaine. 3600 fig., 6^ edit. 

Paris, 1911-12. 



Bibliography 235 

Testut et Jacob : Anatomie topographique. Paris, 1912. 

Variot : Traite d'Hygiene infantile. Paris, 1909. 

Variot et Lassabliere: Sur Vinegalite de volume des 

glandes mammaires chez la femme. (Acad, des Sci- 
ences. Juillet, 1908.) 
Variot et Chaumet : Croissance des Enfants des Ecoles de 

Paris. 1906. 
Varigny (H. de) : Article Croissance (Zoologie) du Diet. 

de Ch. Richet. 
Vialleton : Elements de Morphologie des Vertebres. Ana- 
tomie et Embryologie comparees. Paris, 1911. 
Viola: Le Leggi di correlazione morfologica dei tipi indi- 

viduali. Lavori del Inst, di clinica medica gener. dell. 

Universit. di Padova. Vol. IV. Milano, 1909. 
VoLKOw : Variations squelettiques du pied chez les primates 

et les races humaines. Bull, et Mem. de la Soc. Anthr. 

de Paris, 1901-1903. 
Wagner, W. : EntwicJcelung des Kinderkorpers von der 

Geburt bis z. Abschluss des Wachstums. Hanovre. 

Ver. Ziichtungsk., 1911. 
Weissenberger : Das Wachstum des Menschen nach Alter, 

Geschlecht und Rasse. Globus XCIV, 22 graph. Tab. 

und 2 Taf. Stuttgart, 1905. 
— Die Koperproportionen des Neugeborenen. Jahrbuch f. 

Kinderkeilkunde, 1906. 
— Das Wachstum des Menschen. Studien u. Forschungen 

zur Menschen und Volkerunde VIII. Stuttgart, 

1911. 



APPENDIX TO BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Anthony, R. : Anthropologie physique in Traite d* Hygiene 
de Brouardel, Chantemesse et Mosny. Paris, 1906. 

Blanchard, R. : Bulletins de VAcademie de Medecine, 

Boas (Franz) : The Growth of Children in Science, Vol. 
XX, 1892, and new series. Vol. V. New York, 1897. 

Deniker, J. : Quelques observations et mensurations sur les 
Nuhiens qui ont ete exposes a Geneve en Aout, 1880. 
Bulletin de la Societe d'Anthropologie, 1880, p. 594. 
— Races et peuples de la terra. 1 vol. Paris, 1900. 
— Essai d'une classification des races humaines. Bulle- 
tins de la Societe d'Anthropologie, T. XII, p. 320. 

Gley: Physiologic humaine. Paris, 1910. 

Hrdlicka, a. : Physical difference between white and col- 
oured children of the same sexes and the same ages. 
1898. 

Hrdlicka, A. : Report on anthropological work in the State 
Institution for feebleminded children, Syracuse, N. 
Y., 1899. 
— Physiological and medical observations among the In- 
dians of southwestern United States and Northern 
Mexico. Smithsonian Institution, Bureau of Ameri- 
can Ethnology, Bulletin 34. Washington, 1908. 

Lagotala: Compte rendu sommaire du XIV^ Congres in- 
ternational d'Anthropologie et d'Archeologie prehis- 
torique. (Geneve, Sept., 1912), in Bulletins de la 
Societe d' Anthropologie de Lyon. 

236 



Appendix to Bibliography 237 

Le Double: Traite des variations du systeme musculaire. 
Paris, 1897. 

Le Bon: Recherches experiment ales sur les variations du 
cerveau et du crane. Bulletins de la Societe d'An- 
thropologie, 1878. 

Loth (Dr. Ed.): Observations anthropologiques sur le 
systeme musculaire des negres. 

Martin, R. : AnthropometriscJie und Craniometrische Tech- 
nik. . Zurich. Fiissli, 1903. 

MocHi (Prof.) : Bulletins de la Societe Ital. d'Anthropolo- 
gie de Florence. 

Paul-Boncour (Dr. Georges): Le Femur. (Prix Broca.). 
Paris, 1900. 
— Anthropologie anatomique; crane, face, tete sur le 
vivant. Paris, 1912. 

Pittard: La taille, le buste, les membres superieurs et in- 
ferieurs chez 121 Tziganes des deux sexes (783 
hommes et 430 f emmes etudies principalement dans 
la Dobroudja). Bull, de la See. des Sc. de Buchar- 
est, 1906. 
— Influence de la taille sur Vindice cephalique. Bull, de la 

Soc. d'Anthropol., 1905. 
— Analyse de quelques grandeurs du corps chez Vhomme 
et chez la femme. Bull, des Sciences de Bucharest, 
1906. 

Radosavljevich (Prof. Paul R.): Professor Boas' new 
theory of the form of the head,— a critical contribu- 
tion to school anthropology. Lancaster, Pa., U. S. 
A., 1911. 
— Die EntwicMung des Kindes Innerhalb der Schuljahre. 
Eine Skizze aus der Experimental-Padagogik. 
Monatshefte fiir deutsche Sprache und Padagogik, 
1912. 



238 Appendix to Bibliography 

Regnault, F. : Bulletins de la Societe d* Anthropologie, 

1902-1912. 
Retzius: Ethnologische Schriften. Stockholm, 1864. 
ViRCHOw: ArcJiiv. f. Anthropologie, T. IV, 1871. 
Weissgerber: art., Bouche, Front, Barbe du (Dictionnaire 

des Sciences Anthropologiques, 



GLOSSARY 



acromion. The triangular-shaped process at the summit of 

the scapula that forms the attachment of the deltoid 

muscle. 
amygdala; pi. -lae. 1. The tonsil. 2. A small lobule on 

the lower surface of each cerebellar hemisphere project- 
ing into the fourth ventricle. 
anthropology. The science of the natural history of man. 
anthropometry. Art or practice of measuring the different 

parts of the human body and of determining their 

mutual proportions. 
aponeurosis; pi. — ses. A fibrous membranous expansion of 

a tendon giving attachment to muscles or serving to 

inclose and bind down muscles. 
apophysis; pi. -ses. Any process, outgrowth, or swelling, 

especially a bony process that has never been entirely 

separated from the bone of which it forms a part. 
arachnoid. A delicate membrane interposed between the 

pia mater and the dura mater of the brain and the 

spinal cord. 
arthralgia. A neuralgic pain in a joint. 
arthritis. Inflammation of a joint. 
auxanalogy. The study of growth according to the aux- 

analogical method. 
auxanometer. An instrument which unites the diverse means 

of auxanalogical measurements. 

239 



240 Glossary 

B 

hiacromial. Pertaining to the acromion. 

hicotyloid. Pertaining to the two rounded cavities, one in 

each of the innominate bones which receives the head of 

the femur. 
binary. An anatomical term meaning separating into two 

parts. 
hit ro chant eric line. A line extending from one trochanter 

major to the other. See trochanter. 
br achy skeletal. Brachy, a prefix meaning short; hence a 

short skeleton or frame. 



chondrohlastic. Pertaining to chondroblast, a cell of de- 
veloping cartilage. 

D 

dartos. The contractile musculofibrous layer beneath the 
skin of the scrotum. 

distal. "The terms proximal and distal should be applied 
only in the description of the limbs. They denote rela- 
tive nearness to or distance from the root of the limb. 
Thus the hand is distal to the forearm, whilst the arm 
or brachium is proximal to the forearm." — Cunning- 
ham. 

dura mater. The outermost, toughest, and most fibrous of 
the three meninges or membranes of the brain and spinal 
cord. 

E 

ectoderm. The epiblast or outer layer of the primitive (two 
layered) embryo. 



Glossary 241 

ectodermic. Pertaining to the ectoderm or derived from it. 

emhryogeny. The formation of the embryo and its course 
of development, emhryogenic, a. 

embryology . The department of biology which relates to 
the formation and development of the embryo in ani- 
mals and plants. 

ergogeny. The energy, both potential and kinetic, involved 
in the adaptive processes of living organisms. — Gould. 

ergogenetic. Of the nature of or pertaining to ergogeny. 

F 

furcula. A furcate process or projection. 
furculum. A forked elevation in the floor of the embryonic 
pharynx. 

G 

gangue. An amorphous intercellular or enveloping mate- 
rial. 

germen. The reproductive element considered in its essence. 

gigantism. Total, is an exaggeration of all the dimensions 
of the body; if the exaggeration is only in one part, 
the gigantism is segmentary, 

H 

hyperplasia. The excessive deposit or augmentation of the 
elements of the tissue composing an organ. 

hypertrophy. An increase in the size of a tissue or organ 
independent of the general growth of the body. 

hypophysis. The pituitary body ; called, more fully, hypo- 
physis cerebri, that is, a small, reddish-gray vascular 
body weighing about ten grains, contained within the 



242 Glossary 

sella turcica of the skull. It consists of two portions — 
the anterior and the posterior. The anterior is derived 
from the oral cavity, the posterior descends as an out- 
growth of the brain. 
hyposthenia. Weakness ; subnormal strength, hyposthe- 
nic, a. 



iliac spine. Spine of the iliac is a point or process project- 
ing from the ilium. 

ilium. The superior broad portion of the innominate bone. 

interstitial. 1. Situated between important parts; occupy- 
ing the inter spaces or interstices of a part. 2. Per- 
taining to the interstitial or connective tissue. 

ischio-puhic. Relating to the ischium and the pubis. 

ischium. The inferior part of the os innominatum ; the bone 
upon which the body rests in sitting. 

M 

macroskeletal. Monstrosity consisting in excessive develop- 
ment of the legs. 

meninges. The three membranes that envelop the brain and 
spinal cord, including the dura, pia, and arachnoid. 

mesatiskeletal. Average bust relative to the lower limbs. 
The mesatiskeletal comprise the proportions of the 
greatest number of persons, the majority. 

myeloplax. One of the large multinucleated cells found 
upon the inner surface of bone and concerned in its 
absorption. 

myopathia; pi. -ias. A disease or morbid condition of the 
muscles. 

myopathy. See myopathia. 



Glossary S43 



N 



neoplasm, A circumscribed new formation of tissue char- 
acterized by abnormality of structure or location. As 
generally used the term includes all true tumors, as well 
as tumorlike growths due to micro-organisms, as the 
gumma and tuberculous tumor. 

nubility. The state of sexual development when marriage 
may be consummated. 

O 

ontogeny. A term used to denote the development of the 

individual organism. 
osteogenetic. Pertaining to osteogenesis. 
osteogenesis. The development of bony tissue. 



pathogenetic. Having the power to produce disease; a 
term applied to micro-organisms capable of exciting 
disease. 

pathological. Morbid; due to disease. 

periostewm, A fibrous membrane investing the surface of 
bones, except at the points of tendinous and ligamen- 
tous attachment and on the articular surfaces, where 
cartilage is substituted. 

phylogeny. A term used to denote the evolution of a group 
or species of animals or plants from the simplest form. 
The evolution of the species as distinguished from on- 
togeny, the evolution of the individual. 

pia mater. The innermost and most vascular of the three 
membranes of the brain and the spinal cord. 



244* Glossary 

prostate. The organ surrounding the neck of the bladder 
and beginning of the urethra in the male. 

ptosis. Drooping of the upper eyelid due to paralysis or 
atrophy of the levator palpebrae superioris. The term 
is also applied to abnormal depression of other organs. 

pubis. Pertaining to the pubic bone; that portion of the 
innominate bone forming the front of the pelvis. 



scoliosos. A morbid lateral curvature of the spine. 

scoliotic. Pertaining to or marked by scoliosis. 

serous membrane. The lining membrane of any one of the 

great splanchnic or lymph cavities. 
soma. 1. The body alone, considered without the limbs. 

2. The entire body with the exclusion of the germ cells. 
somatic. 1. Pertaining to the body. 2. Pertaining to the 

framework of the body and not to the viscera. 
spermatazoon. The motile generative element of the semen 

which serves to impregnate the ovum. 
splancJvnic. Of or pertaining to the viscera; visceral. 
sternal furculum. Pertains to the semilunar notch of the 

sternum, also the notch of the ensiform cartilage when 

it is cleft. 
sterno-xiphoidien. Pertaining to the sternum and the ensi- 
form cartilage. 



thalamus opticus. A mass of gray matter at the base of the 
brain developed from the wall of the vesicle of the third 
ventricle and forming part of the wall of the latter 
cavity. The thalamus receives fibers from all parts of 



Glossary S45 

the cortex (of the brain) and is connected with the 
tegmentum and with fibers of the optic tract. 

tic. A twitching, especially of the facial muscles. 

thymus. An organ situated in the anterior superior medias- 
tinum. It continues to develop until the second year 
of life, afterward remains stationary until about the 
fourteenth year and then undergoes fatty metamorpho- 
sis and atrophy. 

thyro-arytenoidal (ligaments). Two ligaments (one on 
either side) extending from the thyroid cartilage dor- 
sally to the arytenoid cartilage which constitute the 
supporting ligaments of the true vocal cords. 

traumatism. The condition of one suffering from injury. 

trochanter (great). One of the two processes on the upper 
extremity of the femur below the neck. 

V 

varices (pi. of varix). A dilated and tortuous vein. 



xiphisternal. Pertaining to the xiphisternum. 
xiphisternum. The ensiform process or third piece of the 
sternum. 



zygomatic arch. The arch formed by the zygomatic process 
of the temporal bone and by the malar bone. 



CHARTS 




Birth 6% years 

Plate II. — Growth (absolute growth) the Ages of 

248 




13% years 15 1/2 years (puberty) 

Evolution compared to adult age. 
249 




to 


^^M 




M 









ii. 






J 








o 

03 

E» 

<5 



S 

»« 



«> 




•^ 




•<» 




o 






cC 


{>>-a 


n3 


«5 


o 


t? 


a 


a 


CO 


a 


s 


1— ( 


UJ 


-^ 


JS 


ti 


V 


'O 


4-> 


cS 
3 


<4h 


O^ 


o 


oT 


«3 

c 

'c75 


X5 


a 




<u 




B 








'U 





4) 




250 




Plate IV. — Stature. Rhythm of its elongation. 



251 



Legends of Plates V, VI, VII, and VIII 

a Vertex, culminating point of cranium. 

b Maximum transverse diameter of the cranium, at its approximate 
place between the vertex and the auditory canal. 

c Auditory canal. 

c' Bizygomatic diameter drawn in the plane of the auditory canal, 
but which, in reality, is on an average, 10 mm. above the center of the 
auditory canal. 

d Chin, median point on the inferior side of jaw. 

e Diameter of the neck, middle point. 

f Sternal fork. 

g Acromion, external edge where the upper limbs are attached. 

g' Biacromial diameter. 

g" Bihumeral diameter, continuing beyond the acromion, the bi- 
acromial diameter. 

h Nipple. 

h' Bimammillary diameter, distance of the centers of the two nipples. 

i Inferior extremity of the sternum (sternal crest), xiphisternal ar- 
ticulary space. 

V Transverse diameter of the thorax at the level of the xiphisternal 
space. 

k Waist, minimum diameter. 

I Elbow, humero-radial articulary space, the greatest bicondyloid 
breadth is 20 mm. above. 

r Bicondyloid-humeral diameter. 

m Umbilic. 

m' Bisiliac diameter, maximum separation of the iliac crests (almost 
in the plane of the umbilic). 

n Iliac spine. 

w' Bispinal iliac diameter, distance between the centers of the two 
antero-superior iliac spines. 

p Great trochanter, superior extremity. 

p' Bitrochanter diameter, is here elevated by two one-hundredths 
on an average, the greatest breadth measured being 25 mm. (131/2 years) 
and 35 mm. (SSi/g years) above the superior edge of the great tro- 
chanter. 

q Pubis, superior edge of the pubis (public symphysis). 

r Ischium, joined to the great trochanter by an oblique dotted line 
(process of the ischium). 

s Wrist, point of styloid apophysis of radius. 

s' Bicondyloid anti-brachial diameter, the greatest bicondyloid breadth 
is 8 mm. on an average above the extremity of the styloid apophysis of 
the radius. 
t Medius. 

u Knee, articulary space, 

w' Bicondyloid-femoral diameter, the greatest bicondyloid breadth 
is 23 mm. on an average above the articulary space. 
V Internal ankle, lower extremity. 

v' Bicondyloid ankle diameter, the greatest bicondyloid breadth is 
8 mm. on an average above the tibial ankle point. 
X Seventh cervicle. 
x' Summit of the sacrum. 

252 



mwm¥ nf \ \\vr4\'\ \vn 



mwh. 




Plate V. — The ages of evolution related to adult age. Relative growth 

(total and segmentary). 

(Plate reproduced by courtesy of the Anthropological Society of Paris.) 



253 



131/2 



231/2 



13 Va 



17 Va 



rfliti?itt!T'^iu'fnHi?n^!'i'"? 



100'-. 



50- 



80 



70- 



60- 



50 



AO- 



50- 



20- 



10 - 



- 




-50 



-AC 



-30 



-20 



-10 



- 



Plate VI.— Proportions of the body at ISy^ years compared to propor- 
tions at 171/0 and 231/3 years. 
(Plate reproduced by courtesy of the Anthropological Society of Paris.) 



254 



*00- 



13 'A 14 V» 15 V« 16 V* 17 Vj 23 V« 

Ar— — T-— — I— — — I 1 I vertex 



^1 



c 




CS 






/^ 




QQ 


I— 1 


^ 
fLi 


a 




0) 


O 


^ 


>) 


•J-* 


■M 


a; 


(D 


o 






O 




o 


W3 


w. 


-S 


r-i 


fT? 


a 


s 


'So 


bJD 


o 


C 


o 


'O 


o 


s 


M 

A 


bU 


+-> 




fl 


<4H 


< 


o 






o 




.a 


O 


<H 




o 






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> 


u 




S 




o 


03 


u 


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X5 


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^ 


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&i 


f 


o 


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u 


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o 


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-H 


(U 


S 


> 


I— t 


;h 


PM 


S 




U 





> 



< 



90- 



- SO- 



TO- 



'S GO- 



50- 



■ m 



40- 



30- 



20- 



10- 



■u 



V 



- auditory canal 



summit of sacrum 
' great trochanter 
pubis 



chin 

7th vertebra 

sternal fork 
acromion 



nipple 
sternal crest 



elbow 
umbilic 

iliac spine 



ischium 
wrist 



medius 



knee 



ankle 



255 



Macroscelia 13% Brachyscelia 



Macroscelia 23% Brachyscelia 



i i I i i I I I M 1 i M I I 



90- 



80- 



70-, 



60- 




20- 



<o- 



1Z10 8 645024C8 fO/Z 
I I I I M M I I I I I I I I I I 



cc* 



- nf 



- U' 



eV. 

■Ml m 



— -n n 



r 
f 1 



- t 



uu 




Plate VIII. — Different proportions of the body in individuals of the 

same age. 

(Plate reproduced by courtesy of the Anthropological Society of Paris.) 



256 




O 
03 



o 

o 

6 

O 



o 



c6 



03 



CO (^ 

.^ 

03 

a 

o 
O 



t^ 



Ph 



v_ I tJ <_> t_l t> — ^ ""^ 



257 



13yi14 14 V2 15 151/2 16 16 V2 *7 
to 4* to -to tJo to "to to -to 

14J4V2 15 15 '/2 16 I6V2 17 17172 



13V.> 14 141/2 15 151/2 16 16 Vj 17 
to Zo -to -t» "Co "to "to "Co 

14 14 '/2 15 151/2 16 16 '/ij 17 17 y^, 







Plate X. — Semestral alternations of growth between IS^/g and 17% 

years. 



A. Bust 

B. Height 

C. Thigh,- elongation 

D. Leg, elongation — 



Inferior limbs ...... 

Weight 

Increase of muscle 

(maximum circumference) 

Increase of bone 

(minimum circumference) 



258 



I ■ i iiiiii| 1 11 4 "Jinni i f i i I 11 11 f I — i.^— — 4. 



B 




Plate XI. — Height erect A, and height seated B. 

A. Represents the line of the vertex of ten boys of 17 years erect. 

B. That of the same ten boys seated. 



259 



plK>L^yvXJ^^ 



rw!2--'"T^q5 


/[Tl--"'—.^^ 


to' r J_i- 


t^jt 4- 


\^^ : , 1_J 


' /u 


, - ^zJ 


^ 


4- ^ 2- 


"7' "T ■ 
-J. J- ►_ 


: -.t-.L- 


x^L r^ ^, 


iRn : J. -1 . 


1 ^ZJl^ 1 


^'^^ - -.11-, 


I ' ^U ' 


- ^ t 1 


r T- -*^ ~ t- 
,\ .- -s i! 


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._j ' _*! 


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. ' r 


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' JZ^i ~x~ 


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i -1 ^1'" 


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X 4zrZ'jr 


~ t 4 t^ 


1 . 1 ■' 


- -1 t -i ^ 


- }- z zi 


\tif\ z 4 LulJ 


-^— 1[_ ' 


1^0 : t Jjltrt 


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: t '4 -tl 


. _, fc_i f- - 


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'•^^ :L ^n: 




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± 



'( "PJ'i^rf" !■'""" iTT"! Mil rT""fT»"" 


"■32.-;iL 


f\nn ' ' .J 


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rt'^O " , :. /l . 1 


^■88 : ^^4_ZC t 


n<fc " \ / . i i. ■ 


m-- 5: 2_j 


no/ - ;^ i^ii ^ ^ 


^^'^ zjL y t ± 


no'? i ' / / 1 


0.82: _,^ ^r 1 izr 


flQO " 1 . ,1 / 1 i ' 


'j'O^lttlll ,1 ^ 


n7Q -itZ^f it/ _t 


mzl Ji I '■^izr ^ 


nyc -tit 11 .. 


u/o -t _z:jx^_...2 4? ^ 


07/ - IQ 6^ ' 5C^C 


U/A _ / 7 / 'r;;;^ - : ^ 


n-^c " / / .1 ,r' '"^ ,r' 


(172-^7 IT" :^^ Jl 


07(1"/ .' ^ ^ 


-i — 1 — 1— 4-J — 1 — 1 — \ — i — 1_ ►., „ . I., J 1 



Wli^lit 




Plate XII. — Check of the effect of gymnastics (height, perimeter, 
weight). The solid lines represent the gymnasts, and the dotted 
lines the non-gymnasts. 

(Plate reproduced by courtesy of the Anthropological Society of Paris.) 

260 



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D. Sickly non-gymnasts 

Plate XIII. — Check of the effects of gymnastics (diameter and girth). 
(Plate reproduced by courtesy of the Anthropological Society of Paris.) 



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birth 6^ years 15 1^ years adult 

Plate XVI.— Guiding-marks. Geometric semi-silhouettes and curves 

of growth. 



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crest of sternum 




Plate XV. — Guiding-marks on the skeleton 
264 




and on the silhouette at different ages. 
265 



INDEX 



Adolescence, defined, 35f. 

Ages, five, 42 

Alternation, laws of, 106, 108f. 

Anthropology, 26 

Asymmetries, 182fP; causes of, 

186f. ; distribution of, functional 

and larain, 187f; laws of, 119 
Auxanometer, construction of, 

200ff 
Auxanological method defined, 38; 

method, 191 

Body, divisions of, 180 

Brachyskeletal, 45 

Brain, weight of, 79 

Bust, relation to lower limbs, 154 

Change of voice, 71 f. 
Chorea, 131 

Choreic movements, 131 
Climate and stature, 59f. 

Deaf mutes, 33 
Deformations, defined, 213 
Development, modality of, 140; 
rate of, 140 

Education, 28; bimanual, 189f 

physical, 161 
Educative moment, 28, 145 
Effort, duration of, 216; relation 

of duration to repose, 219 
Energy, degrees of, 217 
Evolution, ages of, 83; phases of, 

49f. 
Exercises, checking effects of, 

162ff.; results of, and chest 

girth, 164f.; and stature, 162f. 
Eyes, color of, 214f. 

Fatigue and rest, 156, 150f. 

Formula, individual, 221 f.; make- 
up of, 222ff.; its interpretation 
222ff. 



Function, anatomical conditions 
of, 192 

Furniture, classification of, 153; 
choice of, 155; individualization 
of, 152f. ; physiological condi- 
tions governing choice of, 156 

Germen, 28, 66; traumatic sup- 
pression of, lOlff. ; alternation 
in development, 139 

Gigantism, local, 131 

Grand spread of arms, 45f. 

GrowtH, alternation in spinal col- 
umn, 130; augmented, 76; de- 
finition, 23, 25 1 different ages, 
48; birth to seven years, 37; ef- 
fect of unequal on larynx, 125; 
two factors in gain, 161; in- 
fluence of consanguinity on, 65; 
intellectual and alternation, 
147; irregular, 114; laws of pro- 
portions, 118f.; method of study, 
31; organic factors of, 139f. ; 
proportions of body, 47; re- 
duced or arrested, 78; relation 
of exercises to, 63; relation to 
cerebral function, 22f.; relation 
of illness to, 61f.; rhythm of, 
138; and school discipline, 128; 
segmental, 32; and statistics, 
26; summary of data furnished 
by, 28ff.; unequal, 123 ff.; and 
variations, 48; variations in 
course of, 185 

Guiding-marks, 193, 194, 196, 197 

Gymnastics, causes of abstention 
from, 171ff.; and growth, 164, 
168; non-gymnasts compared, 
176ff.; and weight, 166 

Gymnasts, 64 

Hair, color of, 215 
Height, defined, 32; rhythm of 
lengthening, 34f; seasonal in- 



267 



268 



Index 



crease, 61; standing and sitting, 
153f. 
Heredity and stature, 55f. 

Individuality, somatic, 191, 331 
Infancy, periods of, 42 
Instruments, anthropometric, 200 
Intersegmentary relation, 50 

Kluge Hans, 27 

Laws of alternation, 116; of 
growth, resume, 116ff. 

Manual, working, of school furni- 
ture, 158f. 
Method, auxanological, 161 
Mesatiskeletal, 45 

Non-gj^mnasts, 64 

Nubility, biological and social, 98 

Onanism, 136f. 
Ontogeny, 41 

Organs, appearance of, 80 ; disap- 
pearance of, 81 f. 
Organic force and stature, 55 

Phases of life, 103 

Position, necessity of varying it, 
148; normal, * of child, 157; 
scholar in schoolroom, 148; 
sitting, of child, 149f. 

Proportions of body at different 
ages, 41; of human body, 39fF.; 
laws of, 114f. 

Puberty, 29, 73if.; definition of, 
75; coloration of hair, eyes, 
during, 114; dawn of, 67ff.; de- 
layed, 86ff.; duration of. 111; 
duration of period of, 95f.; and 
education, 143; emhryogenic 
function of, 82; and family life. 



93; influence of placental ali- 
mentation, 85; laws of, 109ff., 
117f. ; place of in evolution of 
growth, 112; precocious, 86if., 
113; tardy, 113; psychological, 
89ff. ; and psychological activity, 
141 ; and seasons, 72 
Pubescent child and adult com- 
pared, 96; difiPerence between, 
and non-pubescent, 142; period, 
42; separation from non-pubes- 
cent, 92f. 

Races, stature of,» 58f . 

Record card, notations on in- 
dividual, 212 f. 

Recuperation, duration of, 146 

Relative dimensions, defined, 46 

Repose, duration of, 216; relation 
to duration of effort, 219; two 
positions of, 148 

Rickets, 181 

Room, observation, 199 

Schools age, definition, 21 

Season, and stature, 60 

Shoulders, symmetry of, 182 

Skeleton, 193 

Soma, 139 

Stature, 34; and intellectual su- 
periority, 54f.; seasonal in- 
crease, 61 

Temperament, 217 

Tics, 132; contagious nature, 133f. 

Voice, change of, 69 

Weight, 32; oscillations of, 33; 

seasonal increase, 61 
Work and stature, 53f. 
Working manual, 203ff. 



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